Stand Down at Sundown
by rudybakin
Summary: A virus found in a meteorite, SC-1988, is sent out for testing, to better understand it. In the USA, researchers are working on a strain to develop a vaccine, but when it's stolen, it sweeps the area causing mass panic and more than a few new stands; enough for Joseph to bring Jotaro, Josuke, and Koichi over to investigate. They, with two new friends, must find the thief, and fast.
1. SC-1989

Prologue

January 18, 2000, Washington D.C.

Dr. Warburton walked down the fluorescent hallway, careful to ensure that he didn't slip on the newly mopped linoleum flooring. The tackle-box like container in his arms was actually a box within a box and had four locks on it, but he didn't feel like testing its security himself, the contents weren't anything to sneeze at. Inside was a virus known to WHO as SC-1988, it had been recovered from the site of a meteorite crash and had been distributed to various bacterial specialists throughout the world for study. Due to its highly dangerous nature, the WHO wanted a vaccine developed in case of an unexpected outbreak. Dr. Warburton, along with a few other biologists and chemists, were working on developing one from a weakened strain of the virus, termed SC-1989 they had managed to obtain from laboratory experiments.

Unfortunately, while this weakened form was less likely to be deadly, it was still very dangerous to anyone without above average constitution. There were a few notable exceptions from their work. A few brave volunteers had each been exposed to SC-1989. Most became very ill and a few died, but there were four exceptions. Three were found to be in very good physical health, but the third, a young school teacher who had had medical complications as a child, suffered no ill effects whatsoever. These four were asked to return for further study in two months time, to see if there were any delayed symptoms. Since a USDA research facility in West Virginia had asked for a sample of the virus to study its effects on plant growth, Dr. Warburton had asked the four subjects to meet him in Harper's Ferry, where he had arranged for them to stay at a local bed and breakfast.

As he exited the double doors at the end of the hall and got into the van waiting to take him and the sample to its new destination, Dr. Warburton thought about whether he should have requested more security for the trip. The most recent research on the nature of the virus was still undisclosed to the public, and there were several groups who were upset about the clandestine nature of their work.

"I'm worrying needlessly," he finally said to himself. "They may not like what I do, but why on earth would anyone want to steal something so dangerous?"

January 20, 2000

Urgent Notice to White House

Container for SC-1989 has been stolen. Perpetrator believed to be subject SC-1989-3. Perpetrator entered Dr. Warburton's room at hotel, along with three others. Perpetrator immediately moved to obtain SC-1989's container. Dr. Warburton attempted to intervene, but was intercepted by the three other assailants. Perpetrator grabbed box and immediately left. Assailants continued to hold down Dr. Warburton for approximately 20 seconds before all three fell temporarily unconscious. When they awakened, all three assailants claimed no memory of the past two hours. The location of both SC-1989 and perpetrator are unknown.

February 23, 2000, Tri-State Area and Washington D.C.

News Report

The unexplained outbreak of a virus now known to be SC-1989 has, according to authorities, been contained. Death toll estimates are between 20-50. While no vaccine has been developed yet, health experts are assuring the public that there is no chance of recontamination for those who have already been exposed to it. Experts estimate that, if current containment procedures are followed, the disease will no longer be a threat within a week.

Chapter 1

March 11, 2000, Harper's Ferry, West Virginia

"And they say that on the night of a full moon, like tonight, you can sometimes see her wandering the alley. Now as we move down the street here, you can see..." The ghost-tour guide moved past Janos and Kane down the street, the tourist crowd moving along with him to hear the rest of the presentation. Kane looked after them, looking for any signs of unnatural movement in the crowd, but nothing appeared to be out of place.

"I think I might be the only one around here with one of these things. No one else even seems to be able to see them. Except you." Kane turned back to his older brother with a short huff. "At any rate, I didn't see that any of them has a spirit partner. You?"

"Nothing," replied Janos. "I thought I saw something moving behind the tour guide when he was talking, but then I realized it was the reflection of a squirrel in a window. The light isn't great for this either, these street lights aren't the greatest." The two of them looked around the area at the spring tourists walking to various small museum buildings or shops. "I'm starting to think we aren't going to find anyone else with a spirit. Short of just having it follow us everywhere and seeing if anyone reacts. But that might not be a good idea, given how big he is."

Kane exhaled and looked up and down the street again. "Yeah, you're right. Let's give it a few more minutes though, maybe we'll get lucky. After all, we don't come out this way that often, and this is a tourist area, so there should be a better chance of finding someone here with one." He looked down the street and saw an older American man walking slowly across the street, absentmindedly looking at the windows of the historic buildings. Walking just behind him were three young Japanese men, two of them looked to be high school age like Kane, the third was older and much taller than the others, Kane guessed him to be a few years older than Janos. As he watched, the squirrel Janos had noticed ran across the road and in front a car that was driving far too fast for the thin road. With a screech, the car swerved to avoid it and headed straight for the American man. What happened next was too fast for Kane to totally catch, but it looked to him that the tall man shouted something, and then suddenly he and the American man were a few feet forward and the car just missed them.

Everyone on the street turned to look, but when it was apparent that no one was injured, the bystanders immediately lost interest. Everyone except Kane and Janos. They watched the group cross the road and begin up a set of stone steps leading to a historic church at the top of the hill. Janos and Kane looked at each other for a brief moment, then immediately took off after them, following the bizarre group up to the church. As they stepped onto the stone slab piazza in front of the church, the brothers finally spoke up, since there was no one around.

"Excuse me," Kane began, talking to the American, "excuse me, but are you all right? I saw that car nearly hit you."

The old man turned around and gave a small smile. "Yes, young man, I'm just fine. Thank you for asking."

Kane extended his right hand, "My name is Kane, pleased to meet you."

The man shook his hand warmly, if a little weakly. "A pleasure to meet you Kane, my name is Joseph."

"Do you come to Harper's Ferry often Mr. Joseph?"

"No, I'm actually in the area on business, but thought I would bring along these young lads. This," he indicated the tall man in a long white coat, "is my grandson, Jotaro, but I call him Jojo for short. That," he pointed to a young man with a pompadour haircut by the piazza railing, looking out over the town and river below, "is my son Josuke, and the short boy next to him is a classmate of his, Koichi. If you'll excuse me," he said, turning to a stone bench at the side of the piazza, "I need to sit down and rest, that was some hill we climbed." As, Joseph walked over to the bench to sit down, Jotaro gave a short nod and said, with a slight Japanese accent, "Good afternoon, it's a pleasure to meet you. As the old man said, my name is Jotaro. My last name is Kujo."

Kane hesitated for a moment, then decided to ask. "Mr. Kujo, this might be a strange question, but, do you ever see ghosts or spirits?"

Jotaro gave a start and looked at Kane hard. "What do you mean by ghost?"

Kane was about to try and describe it when Janos interrupted, "Maybe it would be easier for you to show him."

Kane nodded and summoned his spirit, a faint green aura surrounded him and a humanoid creature made of rugged stones appeared behind him. It stood taller than Jotaro at an impressive seven feet, and had a slow bulky build. "This," Kane explained, is my spirit, if you can see him. I call him Fortress Around My Heart.

Jotaro had a look of surprise for a moment, then he quickly turned to the other boys and shouted in Japanese. "Josuke! Koichi! We were right, this guy has a stand!"

"Wait, you mean this spirit is called a stand?" Janos asked in Japanese. Jotaro looked at him in surprise. "Sorry," continued Janos, "I should introduce myself. An honor to meet you Kujo-sensei, my name is Janos. I'm familiar both with your language and a paper you wrote not too long ago. My teacher had my biology class read it for a lab project."

"I see," was all that Jotaro responded. Not that he had time to say more anyway, as Janos turned to explain what he had been saying to Jotaro, Josuke and Koichi arrived, both of them had manifested their respective stands in case things came to blows. Joseph came up slowly and looked at Kane's stand. There was silence for a moment.

"So, if you have a stand Kane, how about you Janos? What's your stand?" Jotaro looked at Janos, speaking English this time.

"Me? I don't have one, but I can see it." He paused for a moment. "Do people who can see them normally have one?"

Koichi spoke up, "Yes, only people with stands can see them. Have you even tried to manifest your stand?"

"No, I always assumed that they show up automatically if you have one. That's how Kane's was, it showed up one day, not long after he recovered from that virus that was going around," Jotaro and Koichi gave each other a knowing look. "His showed up when he was trying to hold up a section of ceiling tile in a building we were helping to renovate. Suddenly, this thing showed up next to him and it was holding the ceiling up. Then it did this," Janos indicated to Kane that he should demonstrate.

Kane gave a small grin, "Your name is Josuke right? Is that your stand?"

"Yes, Crazy Diamond."

"All right then, have Crazy Diamond attack me."

"What?!"

"I'm serious, have him attack me, it won't work."

"All right then. Here we go!"

Crazy Diamond gave a shout of "Dorararara!" as it launched into a flurry of punches. As it attacked, Fortress waved its hands like a mime pretending to touch a wall, and the air just in front of Kane became slightly blurry. Suddenly, Crazy Diamond's punches landed, but they were landing on an invisible wall between Josuke and Kane. Kane grunted in surprise, "You're pretty strong there. But what do you think of my power?"

Crazy Diamond moved back to Josuke and faded away, "That's some power right there."

"Anyway," continued Janos, "I never had one just show up, so I thought that it meant I didn't have one."

Koichi opened his mouth to respond but there was a sudden shout, "OH MY GOD! Jojo, look down there!" Joseph was pointing down into the town below, There was a great commotion; a mother was running around trying to get away from what looked to be human skeletons pursuing her. One of the skeletons had grabbed a young boy that looked to be her son, and was dragging him towards the river, albeit slowly as the boy struggled against the bony grip.

Jotaro took off back towards the staircase, "An enemy stand! We have to move!"

Kane ran to the rail intead, "I'll make a ramp down to the ground, it's faster!" Fortress waved its hands and the air blurred in front of him again, faintly showing the shape of a ramp going up and over the rail, then down to a house's outdoor stair 30 feet below.

"I'll just take the stairs and meet up with you," Joseph turned and walked toward the stone steps as the rest ran down the ramp.

By the time they got to the bottom, things had gotten worse, and it looked that there were about 20 skeletons menacing the town. As everyone spread out to help put down the strange menace, Koichi paused and turned to Janos. "Now would be a really good time to try to bring out your stand."


	2. Spooky Skeletons

**Author note: So this is my first real attempt at writing a fanfiction, I hope it's passable. At any rate, I'm trying to figure out how often I want to update this thing. While it may be more frequent if writing a given chapter comes easily, I will update at least twice a month, health and Wi-Fi permitting. I know that this is technically not canon compliant as Josuke and Koichi should be in Morioh solving a murder according to one of the books, but I like this time frame better than any canon compliant one, so I'm sticking to it. Again, please enjoy, it's mostly just me writing for fun anyway.**

Chapter 2

The skeletons were nothing like they were in movies, sun bleached and slow; these calcium constructions were fast and some of them still had pieces of clothing or strips of muscle on them, not entirely decayed. A few looked to be very old, and were consequently the cleanest, these had parts of wool coats on, or leather belts with the letters US stamped on them. They seemed to be coming from farther down the road, out of sight behind a bend, and there were more on the way, running about as fast as a high school track team member. They were wandering all around a small field area at the edge of the town and were looking like they might burst into the actual town at any moment. A few had grabbed the boy and a park ranger and were dragging them away toward the river, where there were old and beaten footpaths leading into the trees. The boy's mother was cowering next to a nearby house and crying, trying to swat away skeletons that approached.

"They're too spread out for a direct assault, split up and take out groups!" Jotaro shouted as they approached the lawn, "Josuke, Kane, go after the ones dragging people away. Koichi, you and I will deal with the ones right here. Janos, go sweep the area in town and see if there are any more there."

"Got it!" replied the rest of the group. Jotaro and Koichi ran across the road and into the thick of the skeletons. Joataro's Star Platinum appeared and began to pummel any skeleton in range, while Koichi's Echoes followed suit as they worked their way towards the young mother.

Kane and Josuke ran across the lawn, dodging and pushing past skeletons along the way. They caught up to the four skeletons just as the path entered the darkest part of the woods. They were carrying the ranger and boy, both of whom had fainted from fright. The full moonlight coming through the clouds was filtered even more through the trees above their heads, making the skeletons nothing more than light gray images in a shadowy haze. The farther two skeletons continued to drag their victims, letting the rear two turn to confront the young heroes.

"All right you walking freaks, let's get this over with!" Crazy Diamond appeared beside Josuke as he launched into a barrage of punches shouting, "Dorararararararara!" Kane joined in, with a yell of, "I'll break you down!" as Fortress appeared and launched its own barrage on the second skeleton. The two grim foes were quickly reduced to shards, but they immediately began to reform.

"What the hell is going on?!" burst out Kane.

"Fixing yourselves won't save you!" Josuke smashed the two again, but this time, Kane saw a faint golden aura surround the pieces, and they began to fuse with the dirt that the barrage was kicking up as Crazy Diamond punched their bones into the ground. When he was finished, the bones were fused into a ball of stone and bone. "There, my fix is better. Come on, the other two went on ahead down that path!"

They continued running along as fast as they dared, careful to avoid tripping over the large roots that frequently crossed their path. After a minute or so of running, they saw the two victims lying across the path just ahead of them. They stopped running and looked around, but couldn't see the skeletons anywhere.

"Fortress, cover those two," Kane said. Immediately, there was a small dome covering the unconscious ranger and boy. Then they heard movement in the trees, and dimly saw the skeletons standing in the deepest shadows. Josuke and Kane got ready to fight and rushed in.

Janos ran down the street into the heart of the historic town, frantically looking in every direction to see if there were any more skeletons. But no matter where he looked, he didn't see any. He was about to turn and go back when a thought struck him: he knew from Kane's experimentation that Fortress Around My Heart couldn't go more than roughly 6m from Kane. Janos guessed that the same must hold true for other stands. Since he hadn't noticed anyone within 6m of every skeleton, he figured that this stand must be able to move farther away. He began looking around for places someone could hide.

As he approached a small courtyard behind some buildings that bordered the lawn, he happened to look up at the raised train tracks that ran next to the town. Sitting on them, pitch black against the moonlight, was a large black cat, but what caught his attention was its had two tails. Janos decided to get climb closer and have a better look. Once he got on the tracks, he realized that there was a man, about his height, kneeling on the tracks, low enough down as to be hidden from the ground.

Janos was about to move forward, but froze. How was he going to beat this guy? He didn't have a stand. Then he remembered Koichi's advice, if he could see stands, he had one. Janos closed his eyes and imagined himself tossing the man off of the tracks and down to Jotaro. He tried to concentrate on the energy in his body leaving him to do it. He opened his eyes and saw that the man had stood up and turned around, his features hidden by the hood on his jacket. Moreover, it didn't look like Janos had conjured a stand, he didn't see any glow around him; if anything, the shadows seems more intimidating than ever.

"So, I'm guessing you're with those punks on the ground, right?" The man spoke with a slight Appalachian accent, and he sounded fairly young. "That's great for you, but I'm not interested in fighting right now. I've had my prank for the night, I'm going home, so get out of my way." The cat walked in front of him and hissed, Janos could see that it's eyes had an acidic green color to them, and glowed darkly. "Move aside, or you'll regret it," he growled.

Janos thought fast, if he could distract him, maybe the others on the ground would look up and see them standing there. "Does your stand have a name?"

The mysterious man gave a short start. "You know what stands are? That makes sense if you're with those guys," he jerked his thumb in the direction of the lawn, then gestured to the cat. "All right then, this is Spooky Skeletons. Where's yours?"

"It's hiding. If you try anything funny, I'll let it loose on you. You're staying right there until my friend's have finished with your playmates down below."

The man glanced down at Koichi and Jotaro, both of whom were directing their stands to smash the skeletons, but they kept reforming almost as fast as they broke, and they couldn't keep it up much longer. Already they were beginning to be overwhelmed. "I'll take my chances with you, buddy. Get out of my way."

"I'm warning you, don't try anything..." But the man wasn't having any of it. Spooky Skeletons ran at Janos and jumped at him. Janos put up his arms to protect his face, when there was a sudden deep purple aura around him, and from the shadows at his feet rose a black and demonic humanoid shape with no legs and four horns, two curved like a goat, two straighter, like a bull. It swung a fist out and connected with the underbelly of Spooky Skeletons, halting the jump and knocking the feline stand back to its owner where it gave a riled hiss. Janos breathed heavily for a moment, not sure what to make of the sudden appearance of a stand. Then he realized that the other guy was starting to get over his surprise too. "See?" blurted Janos, "I told you he was hiding."

The man growled and looked over the edge of the railroad, then jumped, Spooky Skeletons leaping after him. Janos watched in astonishment as a skeleton caught him below. The man took off into the night, fading into the dark shadows of the trees. Janos climbed down as fast as he could and ran back to where the skeletons had been fighting, only to discover that Jotaro and Koichi were standing alone, the graveyard menace had vanished. "Are you guys oaky?" Janos jogged up and looked around. The two didn't look to be in terribly bad shape, but they were both breathing heavily.

Koichi looked up at the moon, "My first night in America and I'm attacked by skeletons under the full moon. This is like living in a movie." He turned back to Janos and gave a small smile, "But yes, we're fine, the skeletons just suddenly vanished a few seconds ago. Did you find anyone?"

"Yeah, there was a guy up on the tracks. He had a cat-like stand with two tails, he called it Spooky Skeletons. I couldn't see his face, but he sounded young, maybe my age or so."

"What happened to him?"

"He took off into the woods, jumped off the tracks and had a skeleton catch him below. I was too surprised to react."

"I see. Why did he run? He had his stand with him."

"Oh, well you see, I took Koichi's advice and tried to rustle up my stand." Koichi grinned. "It worked, but not at first. When Spooky Skeletons attacked me, my stand just sort of exploded out of the ground in front of me. Like this." Janos tried to recall the sensation he'd had when his stand appeared. This time, something clicked inside and the dark shape rose up from the ground again. This time, Janos gave it a closer look, it was about as tall as he was, the two straighter horns added maybe half a foot to its height. He also realized that it had no legs, its torso simply continued as a pitch-black pillar to the ground. "I have no idea what he can do, but this is what scared off the guy on the tracks." Janos recalled his stand and it faded into the shadows.

"Mm," Jotaro nodded and looked at the trees, where Kane and Josuke had emerged and were walking towards them, behind them walked the boy and ranger with dazed expressions. The mother gave a short cry of relief and ran over to her son, smothering him in a powerful embrace. Jotaro watched her go, then turned back to the others. "What happened to the other skeletons?"

"We were in the middle of trying to hit them in the woods when they just faded away. I even beat two of them into the earth so they made a nice stepping stone, but on the way back I looked, and they're gone too." Josuke shook his head and looked around. "Is everyone okay?"

Jotaro gave a short nod when there was a shout. "Heeey! Jotaro! Where did all the skeletons go?" Jospeh came up at a leisurely walk, looking left and right as if he expected to be jumped at any time. "It took me forever to get down those stairs, and when I finally got to the bottom I could find any of those things. Have you beaten them already?"

"Yeah, and you missed the whole thing old man," jibed Josuke with a roguish grin.

"All right, now hold up." Janos raised his hands. "One of you guys having a stand is believable. Two of you having a stand is believable. All of you having a stand is bizarre. Moreover, you," he gestured to Jotaro, "said that you guys 'were right' about someone having a stand. How did you know that he had a stand?"

Joseph looked at Janos and smiled. "We didn't. Do you remember that virus that ripped around the area not too long ago? SC-1989?"

"Yeah, Kane and I both got it. I had to get hospitalized for it, so my whole family got tested. Kane tested positive, but he never had any symptoms."

Jotaro spoke up, "That virus is from a meteorite that struck the earth a long time ago. There appears to have been more than one of this kind of meteorite that struck, but very few have been identified. At any rate, there was a virus in it called SC-1988. While most people don't know what the virus can do, some scientists we know who work at the Speedwagon Foundation have come to the conclusion that it can grant stands to those that survive it.

At any rate, various world governments along with the WHO have sent samples of it around the world to develop a vaccine for it. In the US, that vaccine prototype took the name of SC-1989. It was recently released after all samples of it were stolen from a government scientist staying in the area. The old man and I have worked with the Speedwagon Foundation before, so we were asked to come here and find out what's going on. Our job is to see if there have been any new stand users made and to find the man who stole SC-1989 in the first place."

Janos and Kane looked at each other for a moment. Kane finally spoke. "Soooo... I have a stand because I got a virus? And Janos has one for the same reason?"

"Pretty much." Koichi gave a big smile. "I'm glad that you guys are so friendly though. We don't always run into stand users who want to help us."

"I take it you guys aren't just here on vacation then."

Koichi nodded, "We're staying in a hotel in a small college town nearby." Janos and Kane laughed. "What's so funny?"

Kane calmed himself and explained, "We live there. You're staying in the hotel in Shepherdstown, right? That's where we live. Janos goes to school at the college there."

Josuke turned to Jotaro, "Hey, if they live in Shepherdstown..."

"I agree," returned Jotaro. he turned back to Kane and Janos. "If you two are up for it, we could use your help with hunting down the thief."

There was a brief pause as Janos and Kane shared another glance. "Sure, we're up for it," they responded.


	3. Wandering Town

March 20, 2000, Shepherd College Campus, Shepherdstown, WV

"...as well as healing and, according to certain extant records of the traveler's journals, the ability to read the future. However, we know from our analysis during the last class, and I hope this is reflected in your papers next class, that these journals present a myriad of problems, and so cannot be used as evidence for the existence of these 'Ripple' monasteries in the East.

All right, remember that you have a paper due when we return on Wednesday, and you will need to have read the next two chapters of the Gordon book. That would be the chapters on mystic healing beliefs in East Asia. Have a good day!"

Janos grabbed his bag and got up. Now that he was finally done with classes for the day, his next stop was meeting up with Kane and the Joestar gang at the hotel. When he'd learned that Joseph's last name was Joestar, he'd taken to referring to the whole group by the name. He thought it had a nice ring to it. As he left the building and began walking to the hotel, he glanced around to see if anyone in the area happened to have a stand manifested. He thought about something Jotaro had told him before they had split up in Harpers Ferry, that stand users attract stand users, and something about that phrase didn't suggest a nice kind of attraction. Mulling over that idea, he walked on, waving to friends now and again.

"Hi Bill!"

"Hey Janos! Wish me luck, I'm off to a psych exam right now."

"Well good luck then. Oh, hey Robert, hey Kali."

"Hiya!"

"Hi Janos."

Ten minutes later, Janos found himself standing in the lobby of the Shepherdstown hotel. In the corner on his right he saw the Joestar gang sitting in a ring of comfy chairs, Kane had already joined them. Janos walked over and sat down in an open chair. "So then, what's going on everyone?"

"The old man here is too tired to do anything today, so he'll stay behind while the rest of us scout out the town today to try and find as much information as we can about who here might be stand users."

"Kane will go with Koichi. Josuke will come with me. You can go with either group, or you can stay behind and watch the old man, we still don't know who that man with Spooky Skeletons was."

Janos nodded, "I'll stay with Mr. Joestar then. I have homework that I could be doing anyway." With that, Janos and Mr. Joestar went up to the suite the Joestar gang was renting, while the others headed out into the small town. Kane and Koichi's goal was to walk the streets and visit stores and restaurants, as well as some local landmarks, and see what they could learn. Josuke and Jotaro were going to search the college campus, Jotaro's status as a doctor of marine biology would hopefully give them a reason to simply be wandering the grounds and buildings.

Shepherd College Campus

"So Josuke, what would you think of going to an American college? You could probably sit in on classes if you wanted to." Jotaro looked around at the various cream painted buildings.

Josuke shook his head with a worried expression. "I get enough school at home! I don't need to come here just to go back to school." Behind them, they heard the clock in the campus front building toll out five o'clock. Large bodies of students had begun to migrate from one building to another, chatting and rushing in order to get to the next class on time. Others, clearly done for the day, lounged about on lawns beside some of the buildings or headed over to the student recreational center. Everything seemed to be calm enough for a college.

They passed a small group of students passing out fliers supporting a man named Arthur Holtz for district attorney, currently engaged in an argument with some other students who supported Emma Jelkes for DA instead, and turned left down a paved path that ran by the college football stadium. More students were walking back and forth along the path, not really paying attention to either of the foreign men strolling along. Because of that, a young girl walked straight into Josuke and dropped her phone to the ground where the screen shattered.

"Oh! I'm so sorry!" said the girl as she stepped back.

"It's fine," Josuke bent down and picked up the phone, fixing it as he did, the golden glow of his stand briefly surrounding him. "Here." The girl blushed and thanked him, then moved on down the road, casting a glance back for a moment before a friend greeted her. Jotaro put his hand on Josuke's shoulder and held him in place.

"There's a couple at the top of the hill, do you see them? The musicians."

Josuke looked up the hill and saw a young man wearing a white button down and black slacks, the girl had a white polo and black skirt, both were carrying violin bags. They seemed to be staring straight at Josuke. Josuke turned back to Jotaro as if nothing was wrong. "What about them?"

"They're walking the same way we are. We should follow them and see what they do."

"Do you really think that they know who the thief was?"

"Stand users attract stand users."

Since the couple had already turned and kept walking, Jotaro and Josuke quickly made their way up the hill to where they would be able to follow them from a safe distance. The couple didn't seem to be in a rush, so they kept a leisurely pace as they followed them. Jotaro checked a map of campus he had and saw that they were heading to the music center for the college. Maybe they were just students after all.

Main Shepherdstown

"Wow... I've never had pizza like this before, it's amazing!" Koichi leaned back in the bench he and Kane had sat down on with a satisfied smile on his face. "Well we've been pretty much everywhere in the town that you said was important, right? There's this main street here, and we walked around the blocks behind us, and down to that pillar memorial by the river. Anything else we should check up on before heading back to the hotel?"

"I don't think so, I think we pretty much covered every area in town so now you can lead the others around if Janos and I aren't around." Kane paused and took another bite of his slice. "Actually, I did have one question, why did you come to Shepherdstown? I can understand why you came to Harper's Ferry, but that's because that's where the theft was. Shepherdstown isn't the closest hotel, so why here?"

Koichi nodded and took a sip from his soda before answering. "Mr. Joestar has a stand called Hermit Purple. He doesn't use it often because it can tire him out from overuse, but when the Speeedwagon Foundation asked him to help, he used it." He held up his hand to preempt Kane's question. "Hermit Purple can take spirit photographs, a sort of... what do you American's call it? Far away pictures?"

"I get what you mean," Kane said.

"Oh, good. Well, Mr. Joestar took a photograph of the man with SC-1989, but when it came out, it only showed a cloud of mist with shimmering rainbows in it. He tried it one more time trying to find where the man was, and through the mist, Dr. Kujo stand was able to discern the town sign. That's how we decided where to stay. We were just sightseeing when you met us."

"Oh, I see." Kane and Koichi finished the rest of the food in silence before Kane continued. "Well I suppose we can head back to the hotel at this point. There isn't much point in sticking around."

As the two young boys continued made their way up the hill, an old car passed by them going the other way. As they watched it in admiration, they didn't notice a young woman walk out of a door next to them and Kane and Koichi both ran straight into her, nearly knocking her over. The woman had a startled look, as if she was about to cry.

"O! I'm so sorry miss! We didn't see you there, we were being so very clumsy…"

"Are you okay? You aren't hurt, are you?

But the woman just hurried off down the street crying. The boys watched her go in a bemused state, before sharing a confused glance and moving on down the street. Behind them, though they didn't notice it, a man dressed in slacks and a sports coat watched them from in front of the door the woman had left. Had they seen him, they might have doubled back to see what he wanted, for he had a furious look on his face.

"Those two," the man thought to himself, "those two just gave poor Annete an anxiety attack, and she's been doing so well this week. Damn them! I'm going to have to teach them a lesson. I'll add them to tomorrow's list."

Shepherd College Campus

"I'm so very glad you can come tomorrow, Dr. Kujo. I know my class would certainly benefit from having an expert in the area give a presentation. Are you sure that you can do this on such short notice though?"

Jotaro gave a curt nod. "It won't be a problem. I have copies of my papers with me. A twenty-minute presentation shouldn't present a problem. You understand of course that I won't be able to stay for questions after."

"No not at all! And thank you again for coming out here to help recover SC-1989. I can't tell you how dangerous… but I'm sure you already know how potent it is. Anyway, I won't keep you any longer. Have a good day!"

Jotaro gave a polite head bow, then turned and left Dr. Warburton's office. Outside, Josuke was keeping an eye out for any suspicious activity. "You know Jotaro, since stand users attract, maybe we should just try and lie low. Maybe something will happen."

Jotaro looked around. "Maybe." He checked his watch. "It's late. We should head back to the hotel. If we didn't find anything, then either Koichi and Kane did, or something is about to happen at the hotel with the old man." So saying, the two began a leisurely walk back to the hotel.

Clarion Hotel

"Well I'm not sure I can do it on command, but I'll try practicing, maybe it'll come to me."

"I'm sure a bright young boy like you can do it Janos, just keep at it." Joseph looked up as there was a knock at the hotel door.

"Room service!" called the voice outside. "One order of steak, with mashed potatoes and corn. One bottle of Riesling, chilled."

"Come in!" called Joseph. The door opened and the waiter came in wheeling the tray of food. Joseph turned back to Janos and was about to continue talking when suddenly, the waiter turned violently and threw the bottle of wine, narrowly missing Joseph's head. Janos instinctively brought out his stand, and the strange creature appeared before him; certainly intimidating, but Janos could feel that, for all its looks, his stand wasn't very powerful.

Janos had moved sideways to protect Joseph, so the man lunged at Janos from across the room with a wild snarl. As he looked at the assailant closely for the first time, Janos noted four points of interest. The man was impeccably groomed and dressed; his eye had rolled back in his head showing mostly white; his movements were unnaturally forced, though not unnatural for a human body; his face was emotionless. Reacting the same way he had the last time something jumped him, Jano's stand gut punched the waiter sideways onto the bed. But he was up in a second and Janos had his stand push him backwards off the bed as he tried to regain his footing.

Joseph gave a sharp inhale and Janos turned to see if he was alright, which was a critical mistake. The waiter took advantage and picked up the food cart and threw it. Janos turned around just in time to see it hurtling at his face. His only thought was to interrupt its path somehow, but his stand was behind the man now because he hadn't been paying attention. As he threw up his arms to protect Joseph from it, his stand's eyes flashed and the floor in front of Janos bent upwards into a spike. Half a second later, the cart crashed into the spike harmlessly. Janos stared at his stand for a moment, as did the man. The man spoke again, "That's some stand you have. I guess my little toy can't compete with that. Too bad really." With that, the waiter fell forward, unconscious.

Joseph and Janos sat in silence for a moment, when they heard Josuke's voice. "What the Hell happened here!?"


	4. Paint it Black

Josuke and Jotaro were standing in the open door to the room with incredulous expressions.

"Get in here quick!" Janos gestured for them to enter. "This guy on the floor just attacked us!"

Josuke looked down at the now sleeping waiter, but Jotaro was more interested in the strangely warped flooring in front of Janos. "What happened to the floor there? Is that this man's power?"

"No," spoke up Jospeh. "It's Janos's. You see, he was talking to me about some journals he had been reading for class. They were written by an old friend of mine when he was visiting Tibet. Janos told me what his homework was, so we started talking and lost track of time, that's when this man came in." He then proceeded to relate the incident, with Janos supplying comments, from the entrance, to the bottle, to his hiccup (which Janos had confused for a gasp of pain), to the manipulation of the floor.

"I see," was all Jotaro responded.

"So, do you have a name for your stand yet?" Josuke enquired as he checked the man. "Last time you said you were trying to find one."

"Well…" Janos hesitated. "If he can do what I think he can do, then I have a name."

Josuke picked up a spoon from the floor where it had fallen. "Try this, I think we're thinking the same thing." Janos concentrated on the spoon and his stand's eyes glowed. Slowly, but increasing in speed, the spoon bent, then flattened into a sheet, which then bent itself into a tent shape. Janos turned towards the window and stared at it. The tent of metal flew at the window, which rapidly warped so there was a hole in the middle. The tent flew through the hole, spinning away for a few moments before it instantly snapped back into being a normal spoon and fell down to the ground several stories below.

Janos allowed the window to return to normal, then recalled his stand. "Twilight Zone," he said, "I'm calling him Twilight Zone."

Joseph looked up at Janos and smiled, "It seems you can bend matter. Not a small feat. But you know what that means." He gave a small cough and continued, "You may be able to force yourself to do it right."

Josuke, who had just finished cleaning the mess, looked up from the man, who was beginning to stir, "Do what right?" But the man began to stand up. Jotaro, Josuke, and Janos brought out their stands again, but the waiter merely rubbed his eyes and looked at them with a supremely confused expression, not seeming to notice the menagerie of stands in front of him.

"Um… I'm sorry. I don't recall how I came to be here. I was taking a nap downstairs in a chair, so I'm not really sure how I got here…" he looked around nervously, as if the group might have nefarious intent upon him.

Joseph spoke up, "We had just received room service for the old man here when there was knock at the door. We opened it and you came in, but you were sleep-walking. You walked in a few steps and suddenly fell. That was a few seconds ago, we were about to call for help when you stirred."

The man didn't look terribly convinced, but since it was the only plausible explanation, he accepted it. He apologized for disturbing them and left, still scratching his head about how he had wound up in their room. Once he had left, the four immediately began discussing what had happened, and what could have caused it. Joseph didn't have any ideas, but agreed with the others that the man was telling the truth, and that he wasn't a stand user. Jotaro believed that there may be a stand inside the man controlling him. Josuke thought that there might be a direct manipulation somewhere, but that the stand was outside the man. Janos was of the opinion that there might be a compulsive component, that part of the stand planted itself in the victim's mind.

They were all in the middle of discussing the various theories when Koichi and Kane walked in. After briefly being fillied in on the events with the waiter and the subsequent theories, Koichi sided with Josuke's idea, and Kane with Jotaro. Janos, too, agreed that his idea was far fetched. As they talked, Joseph got up and walked over to his suitcase and brought it back to where everyone was sitting and standing, the suite had a lounge area.

"What's the case for Gramps?" Josuke asked.

Joseph looked confused and stared at the case. "I don't remember, there was something I needed it for…"

Kane looked at it, "What do you keep in it?"

Jotaro answered him, "Correspondence with the Speedwagon Foundation, letters from Dr. Warburton, plane tickets, travel brochures, some extra cash…" his voice trailed off as a look of insight flashed on his face. "I know what you were looking for Grandfather." He took the case and opened it, flipping through a manila envelope until he came to a set of stapled papers with a police stamp on them. "This was sent to us by the Foundation. It's a facsimile of the police report on the theft of SC-1989."

Jotaro flipped through it quickly, looking for a specific entry, while the others looked at him quizzically. Finally, Jotaro came to the page he was looking for. "There were three attackers in addition to the thief. These attackers all fell unconscious for a short period during the attack. When they woke up, they had no memory of what they had been doing, as if they had been asleep, but dreamless."

Koichi's eyes lit up, "Oh! You said that the waiter told you he had been sleeping!"

Jotaro nodded, "Exactly. I think that this man's victims are all asleep when he attacks."

Josuke shuddered, "A stand that attacks while you're sleeping. That's terrifying. I wonder what that's like."

Jotaro shook his head, "I don't know. But what that does mean is that we won't be safe until we find this guy and stop him. We will always be in danger." He looked around the room, taking note of all the entrances. We'll sleep in shifts. Kane, Janos, you two should head home, the fewer targets we have here, the better." Kane started to object, but Jotaro raised his hand. "No arguments, you two should get going now. We'll see you in the morning and get the search started."

March 21, 2000, Shepherd College Campus

"I know I had said yesterday that I wouldn't have time for questions, but as it turns out, I have a little time. If your students have anything they wish to ask, now would be a good time." Jotaro nodded politely to Dr. Warburton and checked the clock above the door. He had promised to give Josuke and Kane an hour with no interruptions to search every room on the hallway, but his presentation had only gone one for 40 minutes, and the Dr. Warburton was going to end early. Thinking quickly, Jotaro had offered to answer questions. "They'd better be done when I am."

Just as the last question of the class period was being asked, Jotaro saw Kane through a window in the door, he was giving him the "all clear" signal. Jotaro breathed a sigh of relief and answered the question as quickly as he could. Once back out in the hall, he walked up to the two teens, who were trying to decide what soda to get from the vending machine. "Did you find anything of note? Anything to indicate how the thief might have known where Dr. Warburton would have been staying?"

Josuke shook his head, "Nothing. We searched the other teachers' offices, but none of their planners or notes or calendars indicate that day was anything special. I don't think it was any of his colleagues, though who it was is still a total mystery to me."

The trio exited the building and walked down the road deeper into the campus, turning onto the paved walkway that went past the football stadium again. Josuke looked around at the students coming and going. "I don't see anyone from yesterday."

Kane looked around as well, "If the people you saw were wearing black and white like that, they were probably on their way to practice for the upcoming orchestral performance on Thursday. They've been at it for the past few weeks. It's set to be a real good show too."

Jotaro nodded and looked behind them, as if he half expected to see the two teenagers stalking them. No one unusual appeared to be following, and he turned back to facing front. They continued on their leisurely stroll up the hill, keeping an eye out for stands, but none of them seriously expecting to find anything.

Main Shepherdstown

Meanwhile, Koichi and Janos were walking to the bakery in town to get breakfast. The cool air of the morning lazily breezed past them as the hum of the small town reached its peak. There it would stay for the rest of the day, until the twilight sky put it to sleep and quiet would resume. For their parts, the two boys weren't doing anything particularly loud. They didn't talk or shout or sing. They were watching out for doors opening into the sidewalk. Koichi had related his experience from the day before, and both were now slightly paranoid about avoiding a repeat performance.

As they entered the bakery, Koichi gave a start. "What's the matter?" Janos asked. Koichi looked around the bakery cautiously as they approached the glass display cases holding various confections and sandwiches. Janos gave a short glance around and switched to Japanese. "Are you okay?"

Koichi nodded slowly. "I just felt like I could feel someone staring when we came in. Oh! That's the woman from yesterday!" Koichi pointed to a woman sitting at an outdoor table in front of the shop. Across from her sat a man with a plaid sports coat on, and a bright blue tie, at odds with the dark maroon of his button down. He was listening carefully to whatever the young woman was saying, nodding from time to time.

They were about to turn back to the counter, when a curious thing happened. A young man walked past the table and into the bakery. The woman's face went from normal to horrified as he passed, and she turned away from him, clearly scared of him. Once he had passed, she stood up and quickly walked away. The man in the sports coat frowned after the other man, then, after a moment of watching the woman walk away, followed him in. Koichi moved back from the younger man who had gone up to the counter to order. "I don't like how this is looking," he said nervously. The man in the sports coat stopped just inside the door, and that's when it happened: his body was surrounded in a blue aura, and a stand appeared over his left shoulder.

It was shaped like a human, but had fire red skin covered by silken Arabian clothing with a lilac hue. But the most striking feature was the head, which belonged to a snake. The stand moved up behind the man as he was ordering at the counter and put its hand on his shoulder. For a moment, nothing happened. Then the man's face shifted from a smile to a look of utter despair. He turned away from the counter and slowly walked out of the door. He paused for a moment, then threw himself in front of a passing truck.

There was a screech of the brakes as the driver attempted to avoid him, but it was too late, the man was instantly crushed by the multi-ton vehicle. Janos and Koichi stared in disbelief. Then Janos jumped into action. "Koichi-san, that man's is walking away, we need to follow him." Koichi looked around and saw Janos was right, the strange man was walking up the street towards where Kane and Koichi had first seen him. The two of them dashed out of the bakery and ran after him. He turned in to the door and closed it behind him, just before Janos reached it. Once Koichi had caught up, Janos silently tested the handle. It was locked. He brought out Twilight Zone, a black/blue aura surrounding him. Janos focused on altering the lock and after a moment there was an audible "click." He opened the door carefully and ceased manipulating the lock, which instantly reverted to its former state. Before the two boys was a staircase heading up. At the top was a red door with a sign on it. "P. Nesmith, Therapist" it read.

Koichi looked at Janos, "I don't remember that word very well. But isn't that a type of doctor?"

"They're the kind that help people deal with stress or mental health. It seems this one also enjoys causing it. What do you think of us making a doctor's appointment?"

Koichi brought out Echoes Act 3 and nodded. "Sounds good to me."

They quietly walked up the stairs and opened the door. Inside, the man sat with his back to the door, writing something in a notebook. He turned around as they entered. "I didn't think I had any… oh my. You're that boy from yesterday. I'm very glad I don't have to go looking for you." His stand appeared behind him again, it's presence silent but menacing. "I am Mr. Nesmith. This is Paint it Black," Nesmith continued. "I'm an abuse specialist, I do other work, but that is my true calling."

"I'm glad to hear it, but doesn't inducing suicide seem counterproductive?" Janos asked, forgetting for a moment that he was still speaking Japanese. When he saw the man's quizzical look, he repeated the question in English.

"That man killed himself of his own free will. Paint it Black brings all of your failures and regrets to the forefront of your thought. He simply had so many that his only escape was in death. A pity really, I didn't mean for him to die, only to suffer."

"You're a sick, perverse man," Koichi growled at him.

Nesmith laughed. "That's rich coming from you, insolent bastard. You nearly gave Annete an anxiety attack yesterday. And you didn't do anything other than shrug it off. Prideful people like you are the reason there are so many people that need my help!"

"I apologized!" retorted Koichi, indignantly.

"You called what you said an apology? You're even worse than I thought. I'll make you pay for your pride." Paint it Black lunged forward, but Echoes got in between, "3 Freeze!" Nesmith's jacket suddenly grew in weight dropping him to the floor on his back, halting Paint it Black's progress.

"Now you're going to sit right there and we're going to have a talk," Koichi began. But Nesmith was laughing.

"You think this will stop your punishment? I have other means of inflicting pain." As he said this, Paint it Black twitched its tongue out, just enough to catch Koichi's attention. He looked at its face and into its eyes and suddenly he saw in its eyes everything he had ever failed to do. He looked away, but now the images were in his mind and pushing their way in, and he couldn't stop. He began to feel the weight of his worries, that maybe he'd be more of a problem than a help catching the thief; that he'd mess up, like he just had, and never see Yukako again; that the two new American's he'd met secretly laughed at him behind his back.

As Koichi slumped to the floor in despair, Echoes turned to him, now partly engulfed in Koichi's void. Consequently, the jacket went back to normal and Nesmith stood up. Janos stood and looked straight at him. Nesmith looked him and Twilight Zone over for a moment. "I'd rather not have to do this to you too, you didn't actually do anything. But you don't seem intent on letting me continue my practice, and anyone who tries to get in the way of my helping my patients is just as bad as those who hurt my patients." Paint it Black leapt forward and grabbed Janos's arm, holding on for just a moment.

Janos was still for a moment, then looked at the floor with a sorrowed expression. Nesmith stood up and went over to the office door to close it. "I admit, you've got some power there."

Nesmith whirled around and saw Janos looking at him, straight in the eye. "Don't jump to conclusions, I'm no stronger willed than Koichi here. In fact, given the stories I've heard, he's probably braver than I am. But I'm no stranger to introspection. I have a good friend in town, the priest, Fr. Maxi, we talk every week or so. At this point, I'm used to reflecting on how to make myself better, and I've learned not to let my failures keep me from doing good."

"Oh don't give me your 'holier than thou' bull…"

"I'm not. I'm just saying that for all the intensity your power has, it's only really effective when someone tries to run from their mistakes. I think you'd have just as much of an issue with Dr. Kujo and Mr. Joestar. Oh, and Mr. Nesmith?"

Nesmith looked taken aback, but was clearly getting ready for a fight. "What is it?"

"Watch your step." Twilight Zone's eyes flashed and the floor where Nesmith was standing sloped down suddenly, sending the man tumbling down the short staircase. Janos heard a cracking sound as he landed at the bottom. "I suppose Josuke is going to have to make a hospital visit," he mused.

 **To be continued...**

 **My apologies for the quality on this one, I feel like I could have made Nesmith and Paint it Black enter a little more smoothly, but he'll be back eventually so if you like him, don't worry. When I return, we'll be picking up with another stand or two back on campus, before going back to Nesmith's office. Also, I'm lacking a picture for the story, as I'm sure everyone has noticed. I'm looking to get one (probably of Janos and Twilight Zone), but I'm not sure who to go to, so if anyone has artist suggestions, I'm all ears.**


	5. Four Seasons

**I'm happy to announce that I finished this in time for November. I still plan on at least two chapters for next month, and if I have time, a special short chapter at Christmas. Please enjoy!**

Shepherd College Campus

Out of curiosity, Jotaro, Josuke, and Kane had decided to go to the music building on campus to see if they ran into the two students that had caught their attention the day before. As they crested the cement stairs that wound their way up the small hill to the building, Kane looked around at the budding flowers in a small cultivated area at the edge of a patio in front of the glass double doors leading in. They were blooming in many pretty colors, and one young student, dressed in the white shirt and black pants of a music performer, was squatting in front of them, obviously enjoying the view.

"They were dressed like that guy, right?" Kane pointed quietly at the student.

"Yeah, just like that. Is that normal for music students?" Josuke whispered back.

"It is, but only if they're on their way to perform or rehearse. But they're getting ready for a recital in a week or two so that makes sense. What is it?" Josuke had tensed as he faced the doors. Kane followed his gaze and saw three students walking out, also wearing performing attire. There were two boys, one with shiny auburn hair carrying a bookbag, the other had black hair and carried an iced coffee. Beside them walked a girl who clearly enjoyed showing her wealth; her clothing was silk and satin which clashed terribly with a yellow blanket draped across her left arm. "Are they the ones you guys saw earlier?" Kane asked. Jotaro nodded and put a hand out to indicate they should all stop walking and watch.

The trio approached the student in front of the flowers and the black-haired boy spoke first. "Hey Kyle, how're they doing?"

The young reached out and pulled up a few weeds from the flower bed as her answered, "They're looking fairly healthy. I'd like to be able to have them planted differently for next semester. I think the arrangement could be improved."

The girl spoke up, "Did your mom see them?"

"No, Wendy. I think she'd be appalled. They aren't classically arranged at all. And though we don't share the exact same arrangement tastes, I would probably agree with her on this one." Kyle stood up and turned just in time to see Kane and the others watching. He blushed slightly and waved. "Hi, did you need me for something?"

The other three students looked over and Wendy and the dark-haired boy gave them dirty looks. The auburn just gave a smile and waved hello. Jotaro answered, "No, I'm sorry. We were just wandering campus and didn't want to interrupt your conversation."

"Looks like we were right about those two," whispered Josuke from behind Jotaro. "Should we get them on their own, or just bring out our stands now?"

The question was answered for them by the black-haired student. "My name's Ulrich. And forgive me, but I find your story about wandering the campus a little hard to believe. You've been looking for me and Wendy, haven't you?"

The Kyle and the third boy looked bemused. "Ulrich, what's up? Why would they follow you? Do you even know them?"

A electric green aura surrounded Ulrich and a feminine figure appeared beside him. It was icy blue in hue, and built like a figure skater. Its eyes were white and reminded Josuke of The Hand's. "This is my stand, Winter. I take it from your expressions you all can see it, am I right? Now, why were you looking for us?"

"You mean these guys are stand users? All three of them?" Kyle stood up and looked at them in disbelief. "How do you know? And why so hostile man? You're being weird."

"Those guys were following me and Wendy yesterday. We saw that guy," he pointed at Josuke, "use a stand, but it was only for a moment. He fixed some girl's phone with it."

Josuke stepped forward, "You've got good eyes man! But you've got it wrong, we weren't following you for any bad reason, we saw you looking at us funny and we thought maybe you had seen my stand, so we followed you to ask, but you went into class. But if you guys know what stands are, then maybe we can be friends."

Ulrich continued to give him a disdainful look. Wendy put an arm around Ulrich and stared at them critically. Kyle and the third boy just looked at each other wondering what to do. Finally, the last boy broke the silence. "I don't think I introduced myself. I'm Christopher Blanc, call me Chris. My sister is a teacher at the middle school in town. Do you know Jenny Blanc?" There was a pause. "I take that as a no. I don't know about you guys," he turned to his friends, "but I don't have any issues with talking. So, you guys all have stands? Can we see them? I'd show you mine, but that would be difficult."

Kane shrugged. "This is Fortress Around My Heart." The stone titan shimmered to life beside him.

Josuke gave his signature smile, "This is Crazy Diamond." The warrior appeared behind him.

Jotaro gave a short sigh, "This is my stand, Star Platinum." The powerful stand manifested standing just behind Jotaro's left shoulder.

Kyle opened his hand to reveal a short stand, shaped like a seed with eyes, arms, and legs, standing in his palm, only a few inches high. "This is Spring, he's my partner."

Wendy held up her arm with the blanket on it. "Since you can see Ulrich's, this is mine. I call it Summer."

Kane looked for a moment before asking, "The blanket?"

Wendy gave an exasperated sigh, "Duh, obviously."

Chris didn't turn around, but did jerk his thumb behind him. "Mine is called Autumn. It's a tattoo on my back."

"Well it's a pleasure to meet you all," Kane offered. "I'm Kane, my brother is a student here and I live in town. These are some friends of ours, they're visiting the US from Japan. This is Mr. Kujo, and this is Josuke." A loud "beep" emanated from Josuke's pocket. He pulled out his phone and checked it. "What's up?" asked Kane.

"Janos says that he needs me to fix something when we get back. Probably nothing important," he continued, putting his phone away. "Do you mind if we ask you a really weird question?"

The four students looked at each other for a moment. "I guess not," returned Kyle.

"Do any of you guys know about this man?" He held up a picture of a middle-aged man with deep brown eyes and a five o'clock shadow. "He's wanted in connection with a robbery and we think that he lives in this town."

Jotaro sighed inwardly at Josuke's indelicate investigation technique. Then again, Josuke had never seen Columbo. He watched the students faces, Kyle was studying the photo, clearly he didn't recognize the man. Chris was shaking his head, he seemed to be honest about it. Wendy looked intently, but he couldn't tell what she was thinking. But as Ulrich looked at the photo, his mouth twitched in a disgusted expression and he rubbed the back of his neck. Something about the photo set off something in him. But then Ulrich said, "No, never seen him. Now, if you'll excuse us, we were going to go to lunch when you arrived."

Everyone said their goodbyes, and Jotaro waited for the students to leave before reporting his findings. "Therefore, I believe it would be best if we were to follow them." Josuke and Kane looked after the quartet. "While I don't consider them to be a danger as of yet, I have to think that the boy named Ulrich knows more than he is letting on."

"It isn't that I don't believe you," Kane began, "but how are we supposed to get him to confess? We can't just beat him until he tells us what he knows about Steve Bennet." He looked at the photo of SC-1989-3. "You know…" He looked more intently at the photo. "Come to think of it, he does have that familiar sort of face. Like I've seen him around. Maybe Ulrich just thought he was someone else at first."

Jotaro looked at the photo. The man did seem a little generic in appearance. "I suppose anything's possible. But then again, he might not."

The three mused for a moment before taking off at a leisurely pace after the quartet. The group crossed the entire campus and followed them down a small-town road away from the school. They seemed to be wandering in the direction of a park and monument just outside the main town area.

15 minutes after the original confrontation

"Ulrich, I don't understand why we have to go all the way out to Rumsey Park to talk about those guys," Kyle said.

"Because we need absolute privacy," retorted Ulrich, gesticulating with his iced coffee at the empty park before them. The tree leaves had come in, making a view over the short cliff on their left full of greenery instead of the river below. "All right, so you know how Wendy and I met that man who taught us about stands right?" The other two boys nodded. "Well, he warned us of a group of stand users that want to experiment on stand users. They work for the Joestar real estate conglomerate."

Chris gave an exasperated sigh. "I should have known they would come up somehow. Look, your dad got passed over for an accounting job, you don't have to hate the company just for that."

Ulrich cut him off as they ascended the steps to the monument overlooking the park. "You don't get it! My dad needed that job. And he was more qualified than any other person to be a head accountant!"

"Yeah, but your dad wound up getting a better job anyway, so isn't it a good thing…" Kyle began.

"That doesn't excuse the principle of the thing." Kyle and Chris offered no retorts. "Anyway, after Wendy and I saw that one kid use his stand, what de he call it?"

"Crazy Diamond," Wendy scoffed. "What a lame reference. No real art behind it."

"Right, Crazy Diamond. When we saw him use its power to fix a girl's phone, we went to that guy and described them. He told us that they're part of the Joestar group looking to kidnap stand users."

Chris looked unconvinced. "Why do we believe this guy again? Those guys seemed pretty nice to me." Kyle nodded as well.

Ulrich looked past them to the park entrance, where he could see Jotaro's coat through the trees at the park edge. "They followed us here. Believe me now?"

The others looked and saw the group quietly standing in the woods, almost out of sight entirely. Kyle turned back to the group. "All right. What do you propose we do?"

Ulrich thought for a moment. "Well, if they followed us to an abandoned park, I think we should strike first. If we surprise them, we can take them out and then make a run for it."

Wendy and Chris nodded their assent. Kyle asked, "How am I going to get them to activate my stand?"

Chris pointed at some wildflowers growing along the park edge. "They'll have to walk through those to get to us. You can use it then."

With their plan in place, the group walked back down the stair towards where the Joestar gang was hiding in the woods. Without warning, they brought forth their stands broke into a run at the gang.

The Joestar gang was taken aback. They hadn't realized they'd been seen, and now the students were rushing them at full speed. They shared a short look, then charged at the teens, stands out. Then things got weird. As they got close to the quartet, Ulrich threw his iced coffee at Josuke, who batted it away, coffee and ice splashing over him as he did. Immediately, he felt himself begin to slow down to walking speed, and, try as he might, he couldn't move any faster. Ulrich, in the meantime, had increased in his speed visibly. He lunged at Kane, forcing him to put up a protective barrier to shield himself. Crazy Diamond tried to launch a flurry of blows, but he too had been slowed and Winter was able to block his attacks.

In the meantime, Star Platinum went after Chris, who was about to tackle Josuke. As Star Platinum pushed the him sideways, Jotaro felt something small hit his hand. He looked down and saw a seed burrowing into his skin. He looked up to see Kyle and Spring staring at him. Kyle threw a handful of picked wildflowers at him and Jotaro swatted them onto the ground in front of him where he crushed them before moving to get Kyle. But as he did so, he felt the pain in his hand return, sharper this time.

"You don't have much time left," said Kyle. "Once Spring puts a seed in someone, it drains that person over time. It also drains faster in rain, direct sunlight, or whenever you hurt flowers. Unless you tear it out, which I don't recommend, you'll be in a coma by this time tomorrow. I could remove it, but I'm not about to help someone like you."

Jotaro knelt on the ground, the pain emanating from his hand washing over him in sickening waves. He looked up and growled at the boy in Japanese, "Bastard, I'm going to kick your ass." As he said so, the sun came out from behind a cloud, shining directly on the back of his hand, the pain grew more intense still and Jotaro could see small roots moving up his arm. As he knelt trying to fight off the pain, he heard Kane behind him shout.

"Now, Josuke!"

 **To be continued...**


	6. Memento Mori

There was a sudden rumble, and the ground beneath the group shook so hard that everyone fell to the ground. Everyone except Josuke, who had jumped into the air as hard as he could towards Ulrich. Ulrich rolled sideways and Wendy threw up Summer in Josuke's face as Jotaro began his part of the counter-attack. "Star Platinum! The World!" And just like that, everything had stopped, the world's colors growing dim and taking on stranger hues. Moving quickly and deliberately, fighting off the pain of Spring's seed, Jotaro pulled Ulirch underneath Josuke again and threw Summer aside. As he did, Star Platinum gave one strong "Ora!" and crashed his fist into Kyle's stomach. Jotaro gave a short breath of relief, "Time's starting to move again."

There was another pulsating sensation and the everything returned to normal, except Kyle, Ulrich, and Summer. Ulrich found himself on the receiving end of Josuke's tackle, and the two fell to the ground, but Ulrich's increased speed was giving him the advantage in escaping. Summer lay on the ground nearby, nothing more than a large piece of cloth for the time. Kyle flew backwards about five feet and landed on his back with a groan. Jotaro knelt in pain as the roots grew more with the re-exposure to sunlight.

Since Winter had been knocked prone when Ulrich was tackled, Kane dispelled his dome and made a new one, this time on top of Wendy, who had picked us Summer and was about to toss it on top of Josuke and Ulrich. The dome shimmered over her and she began pounding on the walls screaming to be released.

Kane turned his attention to Chris, who had, strangely enough, remained on the ground when he fell. He had pulled out some kind of energy drink shot and was in the process of downing it in one go. As he did, Kane suddenly began to feel very tired, so tired that he wasn't able to react fast enough to Chris running up and punching him down. But Chris didn't attack any more after that. Instead, he mouthed "Meet me later" to Kane and ran over to help Kyle. Kane tried to think but he was too busy not falling asleep, and the dome around Wendy was starting to fade away as he lost concentration.

In the meantime, Ulrich had managed to break free of Josuke's grasp. But as he stood up to begin his assault on Josuke, he noticed that Josuke was laughing. "What's so funny? Finally realized how stupid it was to come after us like this? Looking at you I can tell you aren't eve at our intellectual level. I suppose it's only natural for you to crack under pressure."

Josuke shook his head, still laughing. "I have one of your belt buckle in my hand!" Ulrich looked down at his torn belt just long enough to make Josuke laugh harder as a golden glow surrounded his hand. Ulrich suddenly felt his waist being pulled forward at an alarmingly fast rate. He had a split second to realize what was about to happen and then he crashed at full speed into Josuke's outstretched fist, winding him entirely and knocking him prone. Crazy Diamond gave one solid punch to Ulrich's head and he lay dormant on the ground. As Ulrich collapsed, Josuke could feel his limbs lighten up, becoming as agile as they had been.

"Ulrich!" screamed Wendy at the top of her voice. She started to run over to him, but Chris and Kyle made it first. They grabbed Ulrich under the arms and began dragging him away as fast as they could.

Jotaro had placed his hand in his coat so as to avoid exposure to sunlight and wasn't interested in following them with his friends at a disadvantage. Kane was still fighting to stay awake, and Josuke was still getting used to having his speed back. "Hey, Josuke," he began, "are you and Kane doing all right?"

Josuke nodded, experimentally jumping up and down on one foot, "I think so. Kane, are you doing okay?"

"I'm all right, I… I'm just real… really…" He slapped himself across the face. "I'm really tired. I think Chris did it to me, but I have no idea how he did it." He stood up slowly. "I think getting back to the hotel would be a good idea for me."

Josuke nodded. "Jotaro, can you take him back to the hotel? I have to go meet with Janos and Koichi back in the town. Jotaro and Kane began the slow walk back to the hotel as Josuke wandered back to the main street, wondering what could have prompted his bizarre text: **Broke something important pretty bad, we need it fixed when you have a moment.**

A few minutes later

Josuke approached the door that Janos had texted him after he got back into town. He opened it slowly, and looked up the stair before him. He walked up cautiously, not quite sure why Janos and Koichi had gone into a doctor's office. He knocked at the door at the top and heard Janos announce, in Japanese, "If you can understand this, you can come in." Josuke opened the door and saw Janos and Koichi sitting in comfy chairs and eating doughnuts. On the floor between them was Dr. Nesmith, though Josuke was just now meeting him. Nesmith's jacket threads were unraveled and bound in an intricate web that kept him immobile, with his wrists trapped behind his back and his tie clamped over his mouth.

Koichi waved at Josuke and indicated a white box next to him. "I bought doughnuts while we were waiting for you. Have some. Oh, and this is Dr. Nesmith, he has some broken bones."

"Does he have anything to do with those police cars out on the street?" Josuke walked over to the box of doughnuts, all the while keeping a wary eye on Nesmith.

Koichi gave a short nod as he bit into a cake doughnut. "Yeah, our Dr. here decided he wanted to try his hand at assisted suicide." Josuke gave him a look, and Koichi explained the whole story, from their noticing Nesmith outside the bakery, to Nesmith's stand appearing, to confronting him in his office, to Janos sloping the floor from under him.

When he had finished, Josuke bent down and mended Nesmith's bones. He stood up straight and looked Nesmith in the eye. "So, what are we going to do with this guy? We can't guarantee that he won't try this again. But we can't just keep him locked up either." Koichi nodded his assent. Janos sighed softly and shrugged his shoulders. "Any ideas? You?" He turned to Nesmith.

Nesmith glared at him angrily. Janos looked him over for a moment. "All right, Doctor," he said with a sneer, "you can continue your practice here. But you've seen what I can do to you. You've seen what my friends can do to you. Believe me, if we ever find you've started inflicting this… this…"

"Abomination?" Koichi offered. He'd recently learned the word in his English classes.

"Abomination," agreed Janos, "of a practice on people. We will find you, but the police never will." Then he shook his head, as though clearing it. The group walked out without further ado; as they exited the building, Nesmith's clothing snapped back into normal.

Once outside, Janos sighed again. "I let my anger get the better of me again. Sorry about that guys."

Josuke patted his shoulder, "Don't worry about it. I felt the same way."

Koichi gave a short laugh, "We've had to deal with hiding guys like this before. It's never nice." With that, they began their walk back to the hotel.

March 25, 2000

Confederate Cemetery, Shepherdstown

There hadn't been any interaction between the Four Seasons, as they had been named by Kane, and the Joestar gang since their meeting. When Kane had finally recovered from the drowsiness that had overcome him, he had found a note slipped into his hoodie pocket that had a phone number on it. He hadn't called it yet, he wasn't sure if he could trust Chris. But after some thought, he decided to arrange a meeting near the hotel.

In the meanwhile, Jotaro had been scanning the papers daily for any news that might indicate a stand in action. Josuke and Koichi had been going on trips to the surrounding points of interest, and Kane and Janos were continuing on with their schooling.

The Saturday after the showdown in the park, Janos and Kane found themselves standing in front the Confederate Cemetery on the edge of town. They had picked its location as the ideal compromise. Chris's sister taught as an assistant teacher at the middle school across the road, and the hotel was just a couple hundred yards farther down the road. As they stood waiting, Janos began to talk out loud.

"It's a shame this thing exists in this state. The Union soldiers ran the Confederates out of the Antietam area so they couldn't bury their dead by the battlefield."

"What would you expect?" Kane offered, still staring across at the school like Janos. "The Union army should just let the enemy cross back over for a funeral?"

"True," conceded Janos, "but the pitiable part is that the Union cemetery became part of the National Park area and point of interest. But this one never got any official recognition. All these guys got shot up and no one bothered to remember them."

"I guess that is kind of sad," Kane replied. "Hey, are you going to the dance at the college tomorrow?"

"Meh, maybe. I don't have a girlfriend so it isn't like I have to. And Bill isn't going to be going because he's working on a term project."

"Huh, okay." They stood for a few more minutes before they saw Chris walking along the road opposite them with a young woman next to him. Once they were directly across, the crossed the street to where Janos and Kane waited patiently.

"I understand you got into a fight with my brother," the woman said, with a protective edge to her voice. Her hair was lighter than her brothers, where Chris had deep golden blond hair, she was closer to strawberry. Janos and Kane looked at each other, not exactly sure to begin. "You two had better have had a good reason for it."

"I told, you, it doesn't matter, everyone's okay." Chris looked her with annoyance.

"I don't care, having people gang up on my younger brother isn't cool." She glared at Janos, "Did you feel big, attacking a kid who's smaller than you?"

Chris looked at Janos with surprise, "Actually, he wasn't there. Do I know you?"

Janos shook his head, "I'm Kane's older brother. He and I have the same gift though," he said with a knowing look at Chris.

The woman looked back and forth between the boys, "What gift? What is he talking about?"

Chris turned to her with an apologetic shrug. "They have stands too." While she gaped at him, he turned back to Kane. "This is my sister, Jenny. She's a teacher here at the school." Kane and Janos looked mildly incredulous at this revelation. "I know she doesn't look it though," Chris laughed.

"Hey!" shouted Jenny.

"How old are you then?" inquired Kane.

"I'm 25, thank you very much," Jenny huffed, "so I'm pretty sure I'm older than all of you."

"Only by three years," mumbled Janos as Kane began to talk.

"All right, Chris. What did you want to talk about? Does your sister have something to do with it?"

"She's insisted on coming to this after I mentioned I was going to meet you. She thinks you guys are going to beat me up or something."

"I still wouldn't put it past…"

"Look, Jenny, you seem to be a nice person, but your brother is trying to talk. Please let him so I can get back to my hunting." Jenny looked offended but stopped.

"Anyway," Chris continued nervously, "Ulrich is a good friend of mine. But lately he's been kind of weird. He's been acting like he has something ot prove ever since his dad got this new job. He apparently got passed over for a job with Joestar real estate, but even though his dad got a better paying job in the end, Ulrich's been obsessive about showing how powerful he is. Then that weird flu thing swept the area, SC-1989, and then we find we have these stands. We didn't know what they were, but then Ulrich meets this guy one day. He doesn't say who he is, but he taught Ulrich and Wendy all about stands, and they taught me and Kyle. I told Jenny what Ulrich had told us too. For awhile, it hasn't been an issue, but then a couple days ago, Ulrich tells us that this man had warned them about a group of stand users that were kidnapping other stand users for all sorts of evil things. So when we saw you guys following us yesterday, we thought that you must be part of that group. But when we stared fighting yesterday, I noticed you were holding back, so I thought that if you were really trying to kidnap us you wouldn't pull punches."

"That doesn't mean they aren't trying to. There are plenty of reasons that they would want to hold back in a fight. So, I came with you to help protect you. I don't trust these guys." She looked at Janos and Kane with hard eyes. "You don't believe me? Well let me show you my stand!" A light red aura surrounded her as a skeleton, about a foot tall, materialized standing on her shoulder. "This is Memento Mori!"

Janos and Kane couldn't help themselves. They both burst out laughing at the unintimidating stand. "I'm sohoho… so sorry," wheezed Kane. "It's just, compared to some of the others I've seen this week... ahahahaha!"

Jenny bristled, "Oh, is that so? Well maybe you could show us yours." Chris quietly snickered behind her when she backed up as Kane brought Fortress Around My Heart out. Then both gave a short "eep!" as Twilight Zone rose from Chris's own shadow. Jenny breathed heavily for a minute as the three boys laughed at her stunned expression. "I don't see what's so funny."

"Nothing sis, nothing," Chris laughed. "That's a pretty cool stand there," he turned to Janos, "what does it do?"

"It bends things," Janos replied.

"What does yours do, Chris?" Kane asked. "You did something in the park and I really want to know how you did it."

Jenny started to object, but Chris replied, "If I eat something, I can make someone nearby lose the amount of energy I gain by eating it. Usually that isn't enough to do anything, but if I drink and energy shot, that's usually enough to make someone fall asleep. I'm really sensitive to those things. But anyway, I never told you why I wanted to talk with you guys. I don't think you guys are out to get me. What I really think is that whoever has been talking to Ulrich is using him. I said that he became desperate to prove himself, but now he's kind of withdrawn about himself, and he used to be a lot of fun. Kyle's noticed it too. And now that I think that man was lying about you guys, I wonder what else he lied about to Ulrich and Wendy."

"So, what then? Do you want us to help?" Kane gave him a quizzical look.

"Yeah, if you don't mind. I want to find this guy and find out just what he's done to my best friend."

"If you guys are going to be hanging around my brother, you had better count on my keeping an eye on y'all."

"I told you Jenny…"

"I don't care, I don't trust them."

"Are we done here?" interjected Janos. "I have some hunting to do in the cemetery."

Jenny looked at him, "What are you doing in the cemetery?"

"I'm doing research. Remember that report about a skeleton prank in Harper's Ferry awhile back? Well I heard today that someone saw one in this graveyard last night, so I'm here to conduct some investigation. I have reason to believe it's stand related. Oh," he turned to Kane, "when you get back to the hotel, could you let the gang know that that's where I'll be tonight if they need me?" With that, he said his goodbyes and walked off to get food in the town.

After an awkward exchange of goodbyes, the other three parted ways, Jenny and Chris back towards the school, Kane back to the hotel to meet up with Josuke and Koichi. They had plans to go see a movie. As he walked back, he checked his phone to see if he had any messages. There were two. The first, from Koichi, read: **Ready when you are, Mr. Joestar is coming too and he's buying us lunch.** The second was from Janos: **Do you think Jenny is single?** Kane facepalmed and continued the walk back.

 **Thanks to everyone who is following along. I apologize if this chapter feels clunky, I'm not fully used to writing dialogue sequences that are very long.**


	7. What Have We Learned?

Time: Sunset begins

"All right then, what do we know so far? We haven't found much, but I think Jotaro was right, I bet if we look, we can start seeing some connections in here."

Koichi and Josuke sat in the hotel suite with several snacks and drinks strewn about them, and a collection of hastily made notes and sketches tossed about between them. In the few hours since they'd come back from the movie, they had been recalling what they knew about everyone they had met that had anything to do with stands or SC-1989. The end result was a sheaf of papers, a few photographs from the Speedwagon case file, the descriptions of the four test subjects, though their names had been redacted except for the presumed thief, and a few rough sketches of the stands and maps for locations of conflict. Kane had made contact with Chris again in hopes of meeting with him when his sister wasn't around. He had left to go meet Chris in the main town. Joseph wanted to watch the races at a race track in a nearby town, so Jotaro had taken him. Janos, of course, had gone to the nearby cemetery to reconnoiter and see if Spooky Skeletons was the one behind everything.

Koichi looked over his note sheet in front of him. "All right, first we have known stand users in the area." He gave a short sigh, "There aren't too many here…"

"I'm sure we'll have more than we want soon enough. Who have got on the list?"

"First, there's SC-1989-3, also known as Steve Bennet. Last known address was in Maryland, but according to the records, he hasn't been there since the robbery. A police tip-off indicated he was in this area, but there are no confirmed sightings. What have you got on him?"

"Well, we know that the guy who attacked the old man and Janos had a similar stand power as the one descried by Dr. Warburton. He's probably in the town somewhere, but where exactly we don't seem to have any solid evidence yet. Who's next?"

"Next we have Dr. Nesmith. Therapist with a specialization in victims of abuse. He also likes to abuse the abusers on occasion."

"Seriously. Anyway, his stand is called Paint It Black, and seems to be able to make regret surface in its victim's psyches. However, it appears that it only affects people that don't accept their regrets."

Koichi gave a short shudder and continued. "An unknown stand user with the cat-like stand called Spooky Skeletons. We don't have much on him do we?"

"Not really, just that he can bring skeletons to life in some way, though his limits are anyone's guess."

"The only other stand users we know of are the string quartet. First off is Chris Blanc. Oh, and I suppose we know his sister has a stand, as of today. All we know about his sister is that she has a small skeleton named Memento Mori. Chris has Autumn, a tattoo that can steal energy from others, but only if Chris consumes something that gives him energy."

Josuke continued down the list, "Kyle Norman is the owner of that seed stand, Spring. We don't even know what its weakness is, or how to get rid of those seeds. The only reason Jotaro doesn't have one is because Chris convinced Kyle to remove it as they dragged him away. Wendy has that blanket, Summer. But so far we have no indication of what it can do. Maybe Kane can ask Chris that, I'll text him."

As Josuke texted Kane, Koichi finished the list, "The last one on here is the leader of the group, Ulrich. His stand stole your energy somehow. But it doesn't seem to be much of a fighting stand. Also, he and Wendy seem to have received help from some mysterious benefactor. If Kane and Chris can figure out anything tonight, that might help start linking together different people so we can see who is and isn't part of the theft ring."

"Why ring?"

"It's what Jotaro said on his way out. He thinks that Bennet and the strange man are two different people. But he also thinks that it is too much of a coincidence for two people who hate your family to be in the same town. Bennet hates you guys because Mr. Joestar helped fund the SC-1988 studies. And whoever the strange man is, he doesn't seem to like us very much either. Have we forgotten…"

Josuke's phone began to buzz. "Oh! It's Kane, I wonder what he needs." He answered the call, "Moshi moshi…" He realized he was still speaking Japanese. "Oh, sorry, hello…"

"Josuke! It's urgent! Just listen!" Kane was speaking very quickly.

"All right, just slow down so I can understand, my English isn't that…"

"The bellboy!"

"What?"

"The man who helps take people's luggage! The one that works in the evenings! It's Bennet! I'm dead certain. That's why the photo looks familiar. It's because we see him almost every night!"

Josuke took a moment to let it settle in. "WHAT?! Are you sure?"

"Positive! Oh, Ulrich is on the move, I have to go!" The phone went to the dial tone as the call ended.

Breathlessly, and in their native tongue again, Josuke related the essentials of Kane's call. The two quickly ran to the door and ran to the elevator, but saw a crowd of people standing in front of it. The stairs were not too far away, so the duo rushed over and opened the door. But they only made it halfway down the first flight when the door to the next level opened and a throng of people entered. Suddenly, the door to the floor they had been on opened again, and the throng from the elevator crowded in.

"Hello boys," spoke the closest person, a man dressed in what was clearly pajamas. "I've been waiting for you two to come out for a few hours now, I didn't want to risk it with Jotaro, but you two shouldn't cause me much trouble. I won't kill you, don't worry. I'm just going to borrow your bodies for awhile. Just until I can kill Jotaro and Joseph. Then I can kill you and you won't have to worry about being hunted anymore. Now, don't go away, my friends here don't want to be left alone."

Josuke and Koichi looked at each other with apprehension. This wasn't at all how they had seen the evening going.


	8. Christmas Special - Hunter Killer

**Ok, so I'm presenting this as the promised extra chapter this month, so I've uploaded this and Chapter 7 at the same time. A word of explanation: There will be, for better or worse, many original OCs in my main story. Many of them won't have much time in the spotlight, which is where this comes in. This is a special story, detailing a manhunt that takes place roughly two years after the end of Stand Down at Sundown. This special is the story of some of my minor characters hunting a deadly serial killer over the course of a year. This tale will take place in "real time" more or less, with each installment being released on or near a holiday and taking place on that same holiday. Maybe it's as good (or better?) than Stand Down, but I try to put as much effort into it, though the tone and pace will differ, as it will be presented shorter episodes. I hope you enjoy!**

Christmas, 2003

Shepherdstown

A lone figure walked along the main street, his wide brimmed fedora keeping his eyes in a pitch shadow. The streets were clear, neither snow, nor rain, nor man was to be seen. The new moon didn't lend any light, and nothing but a few stray street lamps gave any brightness, casting a passive amber glow along the figure's route. As he reached the four-way crossing at the bottom of the hill, the heart of the town, he stopped and looked around. Evidently, he sensed nothing, for he began his stroll, moving leisurely down the sidewalk. He weaved along various roads as he walked, eventually stopping before the door of a small brick church, with a sign before it identifying the structure as St. Agnes church.

He knocked four times, then stood waiting. After a moment, the door opened and a middle-aged Italian priest stood before the man, with a serious look. "Any news?"

"None," replied the man. He flipped down the collar of his long black duster and walked in past the priest. "I'm not sure why he's not active, Manuel. Everyone's asleep, the school isn't in session so there likely won't be witnesses. Do you suppose he knows someone's looking?"

Fr. Manuel shook his head. "Take off that Last Crusade hat, Matthew, you're in a church."

The man turned around with a wry grin. "I don't think God pays much attention to me, Fr. Manuel."

"I don't think you believe that," returned the priest. There was a pause, then Matthew nodded just barely, and removed the hat. "Now, as to whether he knows, I can't say. Divination isn't my specialty, it's ghosts."

Matthew gave a slow nod of agreement. "Well at this point I don't think it unlikely that our search has come to our prey's attention. Unfortunately, I believe that means we must try a more direct approach."

"Si, we'll have to ensure he has a reason to show himself tonight. We have an hour until 0400…"

"His playtime," agreed Matthew.

"So we must act quickly to be sure everything is in place in time to entice him."

"I can play the bait; I don't think he'll pass on a direct challenge to his skill."

"Bene, I'll hide nearby to help catch him."

"What about calling the West boys? Wouldn't they want to be in on this?"

"They're with friends for the holiday. Besides, they're still young, they don't need any more of this in their lives than they already have. I think hunting down one crazed stand user is enough for now. They can rest on their laurels awhile yet."

Matthew turned up his collar and put back his hat. "If you say so Manuel. I shall see you in an hour." He walked out of the church and heard Fr. Maxi lock the door behind him. He looked up and down the street. One house still had lights on, clearly still engaged in festive merriment, even at this hour. But beyond that, everything was quiet. Matthew thought for a moment, and then summoned his stand. Twin skeletal wings shimmered into existence on his back, the webbing of moonlight between the bones illuminating the area directly about him like a white candle flame. He gently glided up to the top of the church and looked around for any sign of his quarry.

Two weeks before, Janos had come across a police report on a double homicide in his work with an odd modus operandi. He and Kane had done some private investigating and eventually discovered a seriously deranged man with a stand that could breathe fire. Only known as Hunter Killer, he was apparently the perpetrator of three other homicides in the previous year. Though police were aware of the serial nature of the crime, they had no leads to go on. Each victim had been burned alive with exceptionally hot fire, which was estimated to exceed 1400K. Detectives couldn't figure out where such hot fire was obtained.

Unfortunately, Hunter Killer had been able to make a surprise attack. Though Twilight Zone and Fortress Around My Heart had protected them from the initial blast, Hunter Killer had used a bright flash to disorient them long enough to escape. After that, they had told the rest of their friends, sparking an amateur manhunt among their stand user friends that spanned the whole eastern seaboard.

Though Matthew had been reluctant to get involved, he relented when Fr. Maxi asked for his help and informed him that Hunter Killer's murders were leaving a trail that pointed to Shepherdstown, and that he might be finally trying to close in on his closest pursuers. That had lead to Matthew standing on the roofs of Shepherdstown early Christmas morning, wondering if he was just wasting his time. Leave to the West boys and their friends to get him involved in a wild goose chase. He drifted back down to the ground and let Moon Over Bourbon Street fade away, then turned to the crossing in the center of town and began to walk. As the town clock tolled four, after looking around to ensure he was alone, Matthew strode out to the center of the road.

"If you can hear me, Hunter Killer, know that I am Matthew Thomas. I am a man who is going to offer you a chance to repent. I understand the need to kill, but it won't ever truly satisfy you. Come out, and I will hand you over to the police and try to ensure nothing more than a life sentence for you. I am an influential man when I want to be." There was only silence. "I warn you, if you try to waylay me in any manner, I shall not hesitate to retaliate with full force, and you will not win."

There was a momentary pause, then there was a burst of white fire from the rose bushes on the sidewalk in front of him, some 20 feet away. Matthew didn't flinch as the fire raced towards him. Then, about a body length in front of him, the fire began to sputter, and the stream couldn't reach any more than that. "Thought so," muttered the dark-coated stand user. "Come out and play! Or are you too scared of a man in a coat and hat? Did your mommy tell you not to play with men like me? Do I look like a monster?"

With that, a man in dark blue sweats charged out of the bushes with a shout of glee. Beside his left shoulder flew a small, white dragon, about the size of a house cat. It blew another stream of white hot fire at Matthew, who leapt sideways with inhuman speed, barely dodging the unnaturally fast attack. He began to think he may have underestimated the psychotic killer. Moon Over Bourbon Street shimmered into existence on his back and he took to the skies, flying around the crossing at ten feet off the ground.

Hunter Killer laughed cruelly, "So you've got a stand eh? Yeah whatever, so do those two West guys. I can kill you too if you want, I don't care who dies first really."

"Oh, but I do."

Hunter Killer turned around and the dragon swept at Fr. Maxi, who had suddenly appeared behind the criminal. To Hunter Killer's astonishment, his dragon's claws went straight through him, touching nothing. "Don't look so surprised, you just said you knew what stands were." Fr. Maxi sucker punched the man as Matthew landed beside him. They were about to attack together when Hunter Killer held up his left hand and it began to flash brightly, creating a strobe effect. Matthew and Fr. Maxi backed up, the one taking to the skies and the other losing his corporeality. There was one final flash and as their eye readjusted to the dim street lights, they realized Hunter Killer was gone.

Matthew landed beside the priest and looked at him with frustration. "This is going to take awhile, isn't it?"

With a sigh, his companion agreed, "It would seem that way."


	9. The Other Side of the Phone Call

Main Street, Shepherdstown

Time: Sunset

Kane sat at an outdoor table for the local bakery waiting for Chris. As he idly sipped at his hot chocolate, he looked at a picture he'd brought of Bennet. The man really did look familiar, and the more Kane thought about it, the more sure he was that he knew the man from somewhere. But while it felt like it was right at the tip of his tongue, he couldn't say where. A few moments into his thoughts, Chris strolled up in jeans and a white hoodie, a major contrast from his concert uniform he'd worn earlier that day.

"Hi, Kane! I'm Sorry you were waiting for me."

"No problem, I got here early just in case, I haven't waited long. So then, you said on the phone that you knew that Ulrich was going to meet the guy tonight, right?"

Chris nodded enthusiastically, "Right. After the event at the park, he said that he would call him so they could meet and he could get advice from the guy on how to take you guys down. He invited Kyle and myself to come along to meet the guy this time, but neither of us particularly trust this guy. So, we just told him we were busy tonight. Kyle's gone over to the college rec room to play bowling, I don't hang around there anyway, so I knew this would be the perfect time to follow Ulrich to see what's going on. That's why I sent you that message after we parted. I didn't want Jenny in on this."

"Why don't you hang around the rec room? My brother said it was a fun place to just relax with friends."

"I'm only 17, I've started college early, and I feel a little weird around all the others." Kane nodded in understanding and looked around the road. "Ulrich should be at the bistro," Kyle interjected. "He said that if we changed our minds and wanted to come along, we should come there to meet up. But his deadline is in three minutes, so I'm guessing that's when his contact shows up."

They walked down the street and went into a small shop across from the restaurant where Ulrich and Wendy were supposedly meeting their benefactor. As they pretended to browse the shop, Chris kept an eye on his phone for texts from Ulrich, while Kane half paid attention to the door where Ulrich would leave, and the other half of his mind tried to determine what the best course of action would be if they entered an altercation with Ulrich and Wendy. This time he wouldn't have the advantage of surprising them with his earthquake.

A few days prior, while training in a field behind his house, Kane had found that he could make Fortress generate a powerful vibration that Kane had subsequently dubbed 7th Wave. Together with Jotaro, he had created a failsafe in case they were ever surrounded. When the fight seemed to be going badly in Rumsey Park earlier, Kane decided to give it its first field test. It worked. However, launching an earthquake wouldn't be an option in a small town, he could very well harm passersby, which was the last thing he wanted.

Suddenly, in a moment of perfect inspiration, he realized where he knew the face of the Bennet from. He was a front man at the hotel, he had even carried luggage for Mr. Joestar after a shopping trip one day. He whipped out his phone and dialed Josuke. He heard a voice say "Moshi moshi," on the other end then a pause followed by, "Oh, sorry, hello…"

"Josuke!" Kane began, "It's urgent! Just listen!"

"All right, just slow down so I can understand, my English isn't that…"

"The bellboy!" Kane continued. He had to warn Josuke as fast as he could. Janos and Mr. Joestar had been jumped once before, and the man clearly had no trouble attacking with innocent civilians.

"What?" Asked Josuke, clearly confused as to what the two word exclamation was supposed to mean.

"The man who helps take people's luggage!" Kane explained breathlessly. "The one that works in the evenings! It's Bennet! I'm dead certain. That's why the photo looks familiar. It's because we see him almost every night!"

"WHAT?! Are you sure?" Kane could tell by Josuke's tone of voice that he knew exactly who Kane meant.

"Positive!" At that moment, he saw Chris gesticulate to across the street. Ulrich and Wendy had stepped out and were walking up the street to where a black sedan sat idling. "Oh, Ulrich is on the move, I have to go!" Kane hung up and quickly ran after Chris, who had stepped outside to get a better look at the car. It was a dark red sedan, clearly not cheap, but also nondescript, no sharp edges, spoilers, or unique features.

As the car pulled away from the curb and drove off, Chris turned to Kane, "Ready?"

Kane gave him an apprehensive look, "For what?"

Chris indicated a blue Subaru parked in front of them. "I borrowed my sister's car. She's off doing something on her own in town tonight, so I decided we can use it to follow them. Ulrich hasn't seen it before. Come on!" Chris ran around to the other side of the car and got in. After a moment of hesitation, Kane got into the front passenger seat. Chris started the car and pulled out, just as the red sedan turned the corner at the bottom of the main street. Chris followed after, making sure to keep distance between him and Ulrich. As they followed, the car made a few through the town, then finally drove out past the middle school and graveyard. Making sure to leave a gap, Chris followed.

"Where do you suppose they're going?" asked Kane.

"I really don't know, maybe another town? The highway is this direction, so there's that..."

They drove on for a couple of minutes when they saw the car turn in to the parking lot of Morgan's Grove, a large park near the town. Chris, several car lengths behind, turned left down a side road, and pulled into a parking lot at the other corner of the park. With a look, the two agreed to quietly make their way to where they could watch Ulrich and Wendy. The sun had become very low in the sky, and was now hidden behind the hill they stood upon. The clouds had gained a pink and purple hue, the sky behind fading to a grayed orange. They quietly walked up the circuit trail that ran about the park until they could see the pair greeting an older gentleman in a large pavilion. Unfortunately, the man's back was turned, so they were unable to see his face. The pair moved over to the edge of the trees encircling the area so that they were as inconspicuous as possible among the families playing at the playground.

"How long do we want to wait here?" Kane looked at Chris inquisitively. "The more time we spend here, the more likely that they see us by chance, and then the whole thing is blown wide open."

Chris looked towards Ulrich with concern. "I don't know, what do you think? I suppose we can't risk being here forever. What would you think?"

Kane thought for a moment, then looked at the sky. "It's nearly dark now, eventually it will be too dark to see them, even in the artificial lights, without getting much closer. Let's wait until the sky is close to black, then we can head back if we don't learn anything before hand. We don't know what car that man came in, do we?"

Chris shook his head. "I didn't see which car he got out of, and I didn't notice him in the car Ulrich and Wendy were in."

Kane nodded. "Maybe 15 more minutes then..."


	10. Seal Your Doom Tonight

Cemetery, Shepherdstown

Time: Sunset

The sky had grown black and the stars, only faintly visible on account of the town lights, slowly passed overhead of Janos as he sat behind the gravekeeper house, keeping an eye out for any motion among the graves. He wasn't terribly sure that anything would come up, but after scouring internet forums and asking some of his friends on campus, he'd learned that there had been at least three appearances of skeletons in the graveyard over the past couple days.

"Spooky scary skeletons send shivers down your spine," he sang quietly to himself. "And shrieking skulls will shock your soul..." he trailed off as he heard a sound. But nothing seemed to be moving. Must have been a squirrel. "We're so sorry skeletons, you're so misunderstood. You only want to socialize, but I don't think we should." Nope, there it was again, rubber treading on pavement. Someone had come in over the fence and was sneaking along the road a little farther in. Janos peered into the dark, but couldn't see much. Then he remembered he had a stand.

As the dark purple aura surrounded him, the shadows at his feet coalesced and grew into Twilight Zone. Twilight Zone turned and glided silently along the cemetery road until Janos heard a shriek and saw someone stand up. He willed the ground to bind the person's ankles. "That's weird," he thought to himself as he ran. "Spooky Skeletons has a male owner, but that sounded distinctly female..." Twilight Zone had made the ground around the suspect's feet warp and bind so that her feet were trapped in place. As Janos got closer, he could make out her face...

"So that skeleton of your can make skeletons too?"

"What the... What the hell are you doing here?"

"Well since you're stuck in place, maybe you could answer first,"

"No! Memento can't make skeletons. He just remembers things. Everything in fact."

"Precisely, I remember everything I see, hear, feel, et cetera. For instance, I remember that from here we were able to hear your singing as though at whisper level. Since a whisper has a decibel level of..."

"Don't talk to him!" Jenny interrupted the miniature skeleton.

"Right, sorry. It would seem that I am under orders not to converse with you, terribly sorry."

Janos just stood still with a confused look on his face. "So..." he began at last, "you aren't the person making skeletons by night?"

"Yes!" Jenny fumed in exasperation.

"Sweet!" exclaimed Janos."

Jenny gave him a confused look. "You're happy. Why?"

"Because I was pretty sure I knew who it was until you showed up and then I saw you so I wasn't sure but now I am sure." He looked around the cemetery for any signs of life, but there was still nothing. "I don't suppose that you two saw anything unusual when you came in?" She looked at her feet. "Oh, right, here." The asphalt unbound itself from around her ankles. Then Jenny punched him square in the chest and Janos stumbled back in surprise. "What was that for?"

Jenny didn't bother to answer, she just turned to Memento. "Did we see anything on the way in?"

"Yes," responded the stand, and both Jenny and Janos were surprised. "There was a large cat near the back of the cemetery. It was sitting still but its tails were quite lively."

"You mean tail," corrected Jenny.

"No, I mean tails, it had two," Memento retorted indignantly.

"Why didn't you say anything?"

"Because you were intent on finding the source of the singing."

Jenny looked fit to snap, but before she had a chance, the trio heard a chittering sound. They turned to look further in to the cemetery and saw a skeleton standing at the top of the hill. "What the hell is that?" Jenny shuddered slightly.

Janos wasn't listening to her. "Spirits supernatural are shy, what's all the fuss? But bags of bones seem so unsafe, it's semi-serious..." he softly sang as he wandered towards the skeleton. Suddenly, it gave a bone-chilling screech and ran at him. "That's faster than I expected," Janos thought. As the skeleton reached him, Janos swung out in a right hook, and watched, stunned, as the skeleton ducked him and returned with a powerful jab to his stomach. Janos landed on his back and glared at the skeleton. "Welcome to the Twilight Zone, freak."

Twilight Zone emerged behind the skeleton and tore it apart swiftly, but, in the light of the moon, Janos could see the bones rapidly reassembling. Jenny ran up behind him, "Hey, are you okay? What is that -"

"I won't be when that thing is fixed." He pointed to the hilltop. "Back of the graveyard; you're looking for a guy with a cat near him, your stand has seen him before. Lead him this way, the cat is what brings these skeletons back."

Jenny nodded, clearly skeptical, but snuck off into the cemetery's gloom. As the skeleton finished healing, Janos backed up trying to think of a plan. Then he had an idea. "Mr. Joestar said it worked on zombies and vampires... I wonder if it works on skeletons." He concentrated and tried to breathe, but he couldn't get the right rhythm. "Fine, Twilight Zone, go!" Janos felt his stand manipulate his lungs, and he knew he was breathing properly. "Let's see if I can artificially induce it." He looked down at his hand as the skeleton rushed him, and was surprised and satisfied to see black lightning crackle across it. "Midnight Black Overdrive!"

Anticipating the dodge, Janos feinted with his left and then struck the skeleton's head with his right. The black hamon rushed across the skeleton's body and the bones fell apart. They showed signs of trying to reassemble, but they were very sluggish. "I guess that answers that question. Now where's the..." three more skeletons appeared at the hilltop. "... cat." He looked at Twilight Zone, who was patiently waiting for an order. "Well I guess practice makes perfect. I wonder if you can multitask, Twilight."

The next few moments were a blur for Janos. Twilight Zone would use its superior speed and shadow merging to slip behind the skeletons they encountered and take out their legs to slow them, Janos would follow up by having Twilight Zone force him to hamon breathe and he would use the strange black overdrive to slow down the skeletons' recovery. They had made their way through 13 different skeletons by the time the back of the cemetery was in view. Standing there, with two skeletons holding Jenny in place, was the same guy from Harpers Ferry. Sitting upon a tombstone next to him was Spooky Skeletons, its twin tails waving in unison.

Janos rushed forward but as he approached, the man shouted, "Stop where you are, or else!" Janos came to a halt, letting his momentum carry him a short distance forward to get as close as possible. "I don't why you did this to me man. I've been coming out here at nights to practice. When people come in I have fun scaring them, and sometimes I steal whatever they've got on them. They're typically too freaked to believe what happened, and the few who call in tips haven't convinced the police that anything is going on. They weren't even supposed to be here. No trespassing by night. Then someone heard about it and cam here at night and hid. They were quieter than you two and saw me."

"Well they started the rumor recently about skeletons here and I figured it was only a matter of time before you came looking for me. Spooky Skeleton's power waxes and wanes with the moon. So it's too bad for you you came out tonight; the moon's pretty bright right now." He paused for a moment to look at him and Jenny. Four more skeletons rose up from the ground and stood menacingly around Janos and Twilight Zone. "Now, keep your stand where I can see him. You put me in a bad way. I can't just let you walk out, but I don't really like the idea of killing people." He gave a short sigh. "I don't really have any options though. I'll be sure to give you both decent burials."

Janos immediately tried to bend the ground around the man, but he and Jenny were too far away, just out of range. The skeletons had placed dirt in Jenny's mouth to keep her from screaming as they began to pull on her arms and legs. The four skeletons jumped at Janos simultaneously. The ground beneath him shot out and blew their bodies apart, but they reformed instantly; likely from being so close to Spooky Skeletons, Janos thought. He looked about him for an answer, something to outwit them. Then he had it.

"Here's how this plays out!" He shouted. The man turned to look at him in surprise and the skeletons halted for a moment. "You're going to disbelieve me and go back to trying to kill us. Then, I'm going to break away from your welcome party and reach you inside of 6 seconds. Lastly, I'll take out your stand and show you just how spooky the Twilight Zone is. Ready when you are."

The man laughed and his southern drawl became more pronounced. "Have fun with that, dumbass."

"I gave fair warning," Janos muttered. He felt the ground beneath him sink for a moment, before it sprang upward, catapulting him straight over the skeletons and right at Jenny and the man. He felt Twilight Zone force the hamon breathing again, even as it slipped past the skeletons and moved along the ground right below him. The man looked up as Spooky Skeletons hissed, just in time to see Janos descend on him, shouting, "Midnight Black Overdrive!" Spooky Skeletons leapt up to protect his user, but Twilight Zone interposed itself and rapidly grabbed the cat, swinging it by it's tail into a tombstone. Janos fell straight onto the man, the black hamon rushing across him and knocking him out cold.

Janos lay still for a few moments, winded from his fifteen-foot fall onto a person. When he finally managed to sit up, he saw the skeletons were gone, Spooky Skeletons was gone, and the man was out on the ground beside him. Jenny was appeared to have been knocked unconscious and was lying nearby on the ground where the skeletons had been holding her. Reluctantly, he got up and searched the strange man's pockets. After finding two stolen wallets and $40 in cash, Janos was surprised to find a student photo ID that clearly belonged to the stand user, naming him Bill Hunter. As Janos put the wallet back, Hunter began to stir from his nap. Janos immediately made the soil around Hunter's wrists form into mitts to hold his hands in place.

"Ugh," Hunter moaned as he came to. "What the..." he continued as he noticed his predicament.

"Wake up Hunter. You've left me in a quandary here. I don't want to kill you, but I don't know that I can guarantee you won't start back terrorizing people." Janos paused and looked at the young man in disgust. "However, I'm more merciful than you, so I think I'll let you go. But let this be a warning if you ever try to use your stand for crime." Janos kicked him in the head, knocking him out again. He turned around and saw Jenny groggily standing up. "Are you okay?"

"I think so... it all happened so fast..."

A reedy voice piped up. "In a last-ditch effort to kill you, a third skeleton came up behind you and struck you as hard as it could on the back of your head. The blow was of insufficient force to kill, though you may have sustained a small concussion on par with a minor football injury." As Jenny's breathing became stronger, Memento had reappeared on Jenny's shoulder giving her head a comforting pat.

"Here," offered Janos, "come back to the hotel with me. I've some friends there and you can rest up and eat. While we're there, we can compare notes on what you know about stands and stand users in general."

Jenny nodded, still slightly dizzy. "You walk in front of me though. I still don't know that I trust you."

Janos gave her an incredulous look and was about to object when Memento hopped from her shoulder to his. "Don't mind her, she's just like this. Very protective of herself and her family. I think that when she's less out of it, she won't mind you so much."

Janos nodded and began to walk back to the hotel, Jenny following along behind him. He looked back at Jenny to see if she was paying attention and then leaned in to Memento. In a conspiratorial whisper he asked the stand, "So, is Jenny single?"


	11. St Patrick's Day - Hunting a Killer

St. Patrick's Day, 2004

Shepherdstown

The priest sighed quietly over his glass. "I don't understand how this is helping us Matthew, I hate parties. People get so rowdy and they... are you drunk?" He turned and looked at his companion.

The raven-haired stand user gracefully faced the priest. "No, I am not. I'm doing something called enjoying myself. I do it by involving myself in the party. I understand that most people enjoy doing this; it should be unsurprising that I enjoy it."

Fr. Maxi shook his head and drank more of his green beer. He gave a short hiccup and looked at the liquid again. It must have more carbonation than he had thought. He looked up and saw that Matthew had crossed the room and was talking with a young girl who had finished a lively jig on her violin. Matthew nodded with a smile and walked back. "Any news," Fr. Maxi inquired hopefully.

"None, and that other young student hasn't heard anything either."

"Chris?"

"Is that the one with the tree tattoo?" Fr. Maxi gave a half nod. "Then yes, I haven't heard anything from Chris. This worries me." He looked around the large foyer at the various guests, all friends of the Wests. It was odd, reflected Matthew, that they had managed to befriend so many people they had once been foes of. To be fair, they hadn't made friends with all of them, they still had their fair share of enemies. It was a pity, he thought, that all the levity was being threatened by a single man that no one could seem to find. He wished he could ask Joseph Joestar to use his stand, but that wasn't an option, the old man was elsewhere.

"I'm irked," he continued, smiling rewriting itself into a frown, "that he's only killed two people in the past two months; he's slowing down." Fr. Maxi gave him a look. "I don't mean that I want more deaths, but it means that he's trying to be careful, and that makes it all the harder to find him."

"Don't worry yourself too much," replied the man of God. "For all we know he became bored and is simply going to be caught by someone else." They paused and looked at each other. No one short of a stand user was going to catch that man. "Well, maybe he'll turn up sooner or later."

As Fr. Maxi walked back to his house later that night, he thought over the two poor victims of Hunter Killer had made since their confrontation a few months before. His blood seethed beneath his skin at the thought of that killer running around free because he'd managed to startle them with that strobe power of his. If he found him again, he wasn't going to let him escape so easily.

He looked up at the streetlight above his head as a moth tiredly flitted about it. He crossed the street and walked up to his front door when he froze. The shutters were open. He never opened shutters in his house, he hated indoor breezes. Quietly, he took a step back and surveyed the situation. He pulled out his phone and sent a brief text to Matthew: My shutters are open. I'm going in. Activating his stand, he walked straight through the walls and into the front hall, looking about for any sign of the crazed murderer.

His ghostly feet made no noise as he walked about the rooms, but he couldn't see anyone on the first floor. Noiselessly he ascended the stairs to the second floor, cautious to walk through corners rather than around them, in order to take people waiting by surprise. There was a clap of thunder outside and it began to rain. Fr. Maxi cursed the storm under his non-existent breath, it was going to make listening for movement that much harder. Where the Hell was that flying...

There was a flash right in front of Fr. Maxi's eyes as a man leapt out of hiding. As a jet of searing, white-hot flames passed straight through his body, the priest was grateful for having Shadows In The Rain; he'd have been dead otherwise. As the flames faded away, Fr. Maxi found he wasn't seeing spots, he figured it must be a side effect of being a ghost. Solidifying himself for a moment, he lunged at Hunter Killer, only to be knocked back by the dragon circling his head. He promptly discorporated and fell through the floor. That's when he saw the smoke; the jet had ignited a section of wall.

Hunter Killer came rushing down the staircase just as Matthew came crashing through a window tackling him. The two struggled on the floor, rolling back and forth; Matthew was trying to keep Hunter Killer between himself and the dragon stand. They struggled across the living room and into the kitchen when Hunter Killer managed to hold Matthew on top of himself for just a moment, but it was long enough for the dragon to fire a short beam of fire into Matthew's back, instantly converting most of his clothing into ashes, and nearly disintegrating Matthew; he was saved only by his phenomenal reflexes as he leapt up and off Hunter Killer and through a window into the night, rain and dirt extinguishing what remnants of fire were left on his body.

Fr. Maxi had enough presence of mind to grab a decorative Italian spear from his wall and hurl it at the maniac. It grazed his side as he rolled out of the way, prompting a enraged shout of pain from him. "You'll pay for that, priest. But not tonight." With that, the dragon breathed flames through the kitchen doorway, igniting the curtains and making a blinding wall of smoke and fire. Fr. Maxi moved to pursue but when he made it to the other side of the other side of the cloud, Hunter Killer had moved out. For a moment, Maxi was going to pursue, but decided that putting out the fire was his first priority. If it got out of control it could burn down the other houses on the street. He sighed softly and pulled out his phone to call 911. Next time, they'd be ready.


	12. Back in the Hotel

**If you're still reading this, then thank you and I'm sorry for taking so long. Please enjoy.**

Clarion Hotel

"This is not how I want to die. I don't want to die to sleepwalking hotel people," Josuke thought to himself. The issue wasn't that Crazy Diamond couldn't take out several of the people. It was that there were a lot of people. It looked like the whole stair for several floors down was full, and there was a sizable crowd behind them as well. Moreover, these people were all victims, a single accident could kill someone by mistake, and Josuke wasn't about to let that happen.

"I would like to tell you exactly what is going to happen when I'm done, the horror on your faces would be great. But since I don't know what your stands can do, I won't risk others listening in on this. I think I'll just beat you up quickly. I'll hide your bodies in the suite, and the people who attack you will have no motive, and will have nothing to do with each other. Not that I really care about whether they get off or not, that's just a stipulation of my boss."

The people on the landing below them began to move again. Josuke got into a battle stance, but Koichi put a hand on his arm. "I've got an idea." Echoes Act 2 appeared beside him and threw a Japanese word at the floor below: "batari." Koichi grabbed the rail and jumped.

Josuke looked for a moment, as did the mindless hotel-goers. "You have got to be kidding me." He jumped down after Koichi. As they hit the bottom, there was a soft flopping sound and the floor actually _cushioned_ the fall. Looking up the multiple stories they had fallen Josuke remarked, "That was some idea, Koichi." The people in the stairwell began to rush down after them, some 30 in all. "I think we've overstayed our welcome. Let's find this bellboy!" Echoes faded away and the two boys rushed out into the lobby.

The room was quiet, no one was talking. There was a clerk checking in an older couple, and that was it. No sign of Bennet anywhere. They were about to rush towards the employees only entrance when the doors opened and Janos came in with a small skeleton on his shoulder. A step behind him was a young woman who they guessed must be Jenny from Kane's description earlier that day. As soon as they saw them, Josuke and Koichi made a beeline for them.

"Hey, what's up Josuke?" Janos was smiling. "This is Memento Mori..."

"Guys, Bennet's here." Josuke interrupted.

Janos went pale and looked around the room. "Where?"

Koichi pointed to the stairs. "We don't know yet, but he's got a small army coming after us."

"And you left the room unguarded? What if he tries to steal all the information we've worked so hard on?" Janos gasped.

Josuke grimaced, "You're right. We have to find Bennet fast. Any ideas?"

"He'll keep himself somewhere out of the way where we won't think to look for him and probably behind his army," noted Koichi. Josuke looked at the ceiling, trying to picture where he would hide.

"Jenny," said Janos as he looked at Memento, "have you ever been here?"

"Yeah, there was a PTA in the ballroom here once..." she trailed off as Janos's eyes lit up.

"Memento, give me as much layout as you can of areas on the bottom floor with access to stairwells."

Jenny looked confused. "How would he know..."

Memento nodded, "Fire escape diagrams on walls. I never forget." Five minutes later, the plan was in action.

Bennet sat quietly, looking at the world through one set of eyes, then another, then another, then another, then another, then another. Where did they go? He had his sleepwalkers wandering the whole complex, but he couldn't see them anywhere. It was getting exhausting to manage this many people. He knew he only had twenty minutes at most before the mental strain would render him unconscious; he'd have to get the sleepers back to bed before then or people would ask questions. That would make later sleep walks harder. He cursed silently and kept switching from view to view. Then he saw someone.

Koichi was with that blond woman sneaking back to the Joestar suite. A bold move, they'd managed to outmaneuver his guards for a few short moments. He converged all of his nearby minions on them. "Time to say goodnight weaklings," he snarled.

"Goodnight, weakling," came a response from just in front of him.

Bennet snapped out of the trance and on instinct dove sideways, just dodging Josuke's fist. He hadn't bothered to cycle through the people guarding him; he hadn't expected the brats to find him. Janos and Josuke had their stands out, eyeing Bennet with menace.


	13. Dead Boys Don't Cry

Chapter 11

The racetrack and casino in Charles Town

"Awww, that's a shame. That's your fourth straight loss Jotaro..."

"And your sixth straight win old man. I thought you said you were too tired to use that stupid vine."

Joseph gave a look of naive surprise. "Why Jotaro, you aren't suggesting I'm cheating, are you? Don't be sour, I'm sure you'll have better luck soon."

Jotaro sighed. "Yare yare..." he looked up at the cameras in the room. "You'd better hope none of the sceurity here have stands." He got up and looked around for a table with open seats that didn't have his grandfather at it.

"Suit yourself, I'm sticking around here." Joseph looked back around the table with a glint in his eye. "I wonder who my next victim is."

Clarion Hotel

Josuke and Janos had used Twilight Zone's warping to create holes in walls to peek around corners and so managed to evade Bennet's sentries as they began to search through stairwells. Since Jano's stand lacked the power to unlock keycard locks, Crazy Diamond had simply smashed in the doors and then fixed the locks behind them. Now, standing over the man that been their goal, it all felt a bit anticlimactic. Then he brought out his own stand.

"That's bigger than I expected," was all Josuke said.

The stand was impressively built. It was easily six feet or more, and looked like some kind of super-buff werewolf. Its fur had a sliver sheen to it, and its eyes were a sickening bloody red, like a lunar eclipse. The most intimidating part was its oppressive aura; it was definitely stronger than Twilight Zone, possibly an even match for Crazy Diamond. It gave a low snarl as it eyed up the two stands in front of it.

"Dead Boys Don't Cry. That's its name. It's also a promise. Once I'm done here, you won't have to worry about being scared any more. I guess you thought he'd be weak since he controls all these people at a range, eh?" Bennet gave a grin more bestial than human.

"Well, that was our assumption..." Janos thought back over all the careful planning which was now wasted. This thing wasn't something he could handle on his own, and as much as he trusted Josuke, he wasn't sure Crazy Diamond could either.

Bennet knew that while he wasn't actively controlling his minions they would operate on whatever his last order was. He figured if he could distract these two a bit longer, then his minions would take out Koichi and the woman; he could at least get a partial victory. He reached out with the back of his mind, commanding the nearest minions to converge on him. Just a few moments and he'd have back up. "I'm impressed that you found me, how did you pull that off?"

"Well we looked at a floor map of fire escaped and made an educated guess..."

"Don't give away our strategy! He could still be communicating with the enemy!" Josuke shouted at Janos.

Janos looked down, "Oh, right. Um, let's just forget that happened and get straight to kicking his ass."

Josuke cracked his knuckles. "That, we can agree on."

With a shout of "Dorarararara!" Crazy Diamond launched a barrage of punches at Dead Boys Don't Cry. The lupine stand blocked the barrage and returned with a sweeping kick, but Twilight Zone warped the floor so that the kick missed entirely. Bennet and his stand growled in unison as Crazy Diamond launched a second barrage. This time, Bennet dodged to the side and stood up, his stand moving the other way. Taking advantage of Bennet's lack of protection, Josuke went after him leaving his stand to fight the werewolf. But as Josuke tried to begin his own assault, Bennet lunged forward with a snarl, gut punching Josuke and winding him. As Crazy Diamond began to fade, Janos tried to rush to his defense, but the wolf interposed itself, blocking Janos's view so he couldn't see what he was trying to warp.

Twilight Zone tried to launch his own flurry of punches, but they were easily deflected by Dead Boys Don't Cry. Janos stepepd back to get room, and the door behind him opened, and in walked some sleepwalkers. Janos used Twilight Zone for a split moment on his lungs. "Midnight Black Overdrive!" The black hamon flickered across the first sleepwalker's body, and he fell to the ground and Dead Boys Don't Cry recoiled in pain for a second. Bennet paused and gave Janos a look of incredulity.

"Do you always shout the name of your attack? What are you, six?"

"Shut up," answered Josuke.

Bennet turned just in time to see a barrage of pink. He hit the far wall and got up slowly, his stand returning to his side. "I guess I underestimated you punks. So here's my deal: You let me leave the building, and in return, I don't have any of the sleepwalker kill themselves. They'll do it, they're just dreaming. My stand runs them like a puppet master when they sleep. It just takes a tiny bit of my own thought and I can have one of them break another's neck." He breathed heavily but he looked serious. He smirked. "You can use that black demon there to keep from moving if you get lucky, but you can't stop me from thinking."

Janos looked at the people behind him. If it was just them, he and Josuke could stop the sleepers from hurting anyone. But Josuke had said there were several people, and it was safe to assume that there were people they wouldn't get to in time, or even know about until too late. Looking at Josuke, Janos saw he was having the same thoughts. Josuke spoke first.

"Take back your stand and we'll escort you to the main doors. We won't follow you any farther than that. If we find out that you killed someone anyway, we won't have any mercy the next time we see you."

Bennet grinned, showing his teeth and looking more like his stand every moment. "Deal, kid."

Outside the casino at the horse races

While Jotaro went back in to the casino bar to get something to drink, Joseph looked through his program to decide which horse to bet on next. As he looked over the options, a man in a long black wool overcoat sat beside him and gave a courteous nod before opening his own program. The two of them got up, made their bets, and returned to their seats.

Finally, Joseph broke the polite silence.

"It's been some time since I've seen a vampire."

The man smirked, a single fang showing in his grin, "It's been some time since someone was able to correctly identify what I am."

"To what do I owe the pleasure old man?"

The vampire chuckled despite his serious demeanor, "Not much, spring chicken. You're a Joestar, right? I'm familiar with a certain other vampire I believe you've had some dealing with. I haven't heard from him lately, but, then again, Brando and I never did see eye to eye. Is he well?" The man was staring intently at the track, but his voice was oiled with condescension.

"Oh I'm sure he's enjoying his daily sunbathing in Hell."

"Really? Cairo's air didn't agree with him? Or perhaps he was played in the kiddie pool too long and drowned in the ripples."

"It was truly tragic," Joseph replied, also staring at the track as the horses were trotting to place. "He just wanted a bit more time to watch the sun rise."

There was another soft laugh from the dead man. "He always was impatient." The horses had started. "Was he stupid too? Or do most of your enemies not notice when a stand is creeping behind them? I take it that thing conducts hamon?"

Joseph kept his gaze on the race in front of him. "It's not the only thing around here that conducts hamon. This bench we're on is metallic you know." Joseph saw Jotaro making his way up the bleachers towards them. "I suppose you'd have been able to avoid that though."

"True, I pride myself on speed as much as the next vampire I suppose." The undead man shifted his gaze to Jotaro. "Is that young man there a friend of yours? He seems to have a rather potent aura about him."

"What is it you're after Mr..." Joseph broke off and sighed as his horse came in second.

"Brando was wrong, you don't seem incapable all that much. I'd be delighted to hear about how to finished him some day. But at the moment, I've winnings to collect. Unlike you, I don't only bet on my horse to take first." The man stood and walked down and away as Jotaro approached.

Jotaro looked over his shoulder. "Who was that guy?"

Clarion Hotel; the Joestar suite

"So not only did we not capture the guy we were trying to catch, you two actually gave him a polite escort out of the building and then didn't even check to see if he had doubled back?" Jenny had her hands on her hips and was glaring at Janos and Josuke.

Koichi tried to smooth things out. "Don't be too harsh, they were just trying to protect the people in the hotel..."

"Yeah, by letting the guy that could hurt them walk free!"

"I didn't like any more than you guys did, but I'm not going to let anyone die when I can protect them." Josuke had a seriously pissed off vibe, but Jenny either didn't notice or didn't care.

"That's all well and good," she continued, "until he comes back and makes things worse because he's got a handle on what we can do."

Something clicked in Janos's head and as he looked up, he saw Koichi had made a revelation too. "Why hasn't he killed us before?" Janos looked around at the group, "He's easily had the chance. So why wait until tonight?"

Koichi was nodding in agreement. "When we were trapped on the stairs, he mentioned something about wanting Jotaro-san to be gone before he went after us. So it's possible that he wasn't sure he'd be able to defeat him."

Josuke nodded, "Then let's start from the assumption that Bennet is trying to avoid Jotaro. That means he's not really powerful. He's strong, but he needs things to be in a controlled situation."

Jenny interjected again, "So does anyone actually have any ideas on how to catch this guy before he tries to kill us?"

"Not to be insensitive," Janos began, "but you're not exactly part of us. Like, he saw you, but he doesn't know who you are. You don't have to worry about him coming after you if you want to leave. The rest of us can handle ourselves, but your stand isn't really the combat type."

Jenny was going to retort when Koichi picked up his cellphone and answered an incoming call. "Hai..." His face went white. "Right, we're on our way," he shouted. "Josuke, we need to get down to the first floor now! Jotaro has been injured." The gang rushed out and Jenny followed asking what was going on. Janos translated for her as they rushed down the staircase.

"Who's Jotaro?"

"He's the strongest stand user I've met. And he can... well let's just say his ability is really powerful. If he's been hurt, that means he was fighting someone with tremendous speed and power."

As the gang entered the lobby, they saw Jotaro sitting in the corner slumped over. He was bleeding from twin holes in his upper right shoulder.

"What happened?" Josuke inquired as he began to heal the injured stand user.

Joseph answered him, "Vampire."


	14. Veni, Vidi, Damnavi

Chapter 12

March 26 2000

Time: Afternoon

Shepherdstown

There was one question on everyone's mind: how did Jotaro get beaten by a vampire and where was the vampire now? There were some other questions that were brought up while the West brothers and the Joestar gang ate doughnuts at the small bakery. Questions like, was anyone going to attend the school dance? (Jotaro was going in order to scout for stand users, Janos agreed to tag along since he was a student). How did Kane's mission to spy on Ulrich go? (Nothing of interest happened and they lost track of the man Wendy and Ulrich had been meeting). What happened with Bennet? (Josuke and Koichi took turns informing everyone of what happened during parts they missed). Was there any indication on whether the other three test subjects had joined Bennet? (No one had any answers to that since names had been redacted).

But eventually, Koichi voiced the question they were all thinking. "Jotaro-san, what happened with that vampire?"

Jotaro sighed and sat up a bit straighter. "That bastard got the drop on me..."

March 25, 2000

Late night

The parking lot at the racetrack

Joseph was getting into the passenger side of the car when Jotaro noticed movement in the corner of his eye. He whipped around just in time to see the man Jospeh had identified as a vampire dive silently between two parked cars. "Wait here old man, I think we've got a welcoming party." He walked back to where he had seen the undead creature and looked around, but neither he nor Star Platinum could see any movement. "All right, come on out and fight. I beat one of you before, so I'm not afraid to kick your ass too."

There was nothing for a moment, and then there were two beams of bright pink coming from behind him. Jotaro spun and the beams caught him in the shoulder before he had a moment to bock. All in an instant, the vampire seemed to be right in front of him. "Star Platinum, The World!" The vampire froze just in front of him, perfectly positioned for a beating, and Jotaro was happy to oblige. "Oraoraoraoraoraora!" As time snapped back to normal, the surprised man found himself flying through the air and out of the parking lot, into the adjoining stable area. Jotaro ran after him to finish him off, but when he got there, he found the man draining blood from a horse.

"I don't like draining animals, they don't deserve to suffer. And as a matter of principle, I try to stay away from human blood, I'm not savage. I wouldn't risk going after that old man, hamon blood tends to be dangerous for my kind. You, on the other hand, don't seem to be able to use hamon. Hit me like that again and it'll be your blood I'm spilling."

"You're saying I should sit still and let you hit me?"

"Do you lack intelligence as well as emotions? Of course not, I'm merely testing your reflexes. You're not being very impressive either, Jotaro Kujo. I can see how your grandfather could beat Brando, he's at least somewhat cunning. If you were in the group it's a wonder no one died." Jotaro's fist clenched. "Oh, my mistake. You did get someone killed, didn't you?"

Star Platinum lashed out at the vampire as Jotaro stopped time, but the vampire was incerdibly fast, leaping backwards and landing 20m away before time had stopped. Jotaro closed most of the distance, but as time resumed, he had to throw himself sideways to dodge another blast of pink rays. They missed, but the vampire was already on the move. As Jotaro came up from his roll, he felt a fist drive into his back, and he felt his body leave the ground. For a split second, he was flying through the air, and then he was rolling along until his body hit the car Joseph was in. He looked up, but the man wasn't making any moves to close the distance.

"I didn't even use my stand. This is the difference between a vampire who knows his own limits and a vampire who doesn't. I'll be sure to pay a visit to you later; I have contact who can find you no matter where you are. Expect me during the following week. I'm busy with an old friend tomorrow." He gave a brief wave, that managed to look both antiquated and modern, and vanished into the cars behind him.

March 26, 2000

Back with the group at the bakery

Koichi shuddered, "That's pretty scary. Bennet is bad enough, but this guy's actualy monster."

"I don't think we'll have to worry about him tonight. His strength will make him arrogant, so I believe he was telling the truth. He won't attack tonight. However, the rest of you should try to be indoors by nightfall until we can work out a plan to deal with him." The gang agreed and they finished up their meal in contemplation.

4 hours later

Butcher Center

"Don't forget! The drawing for the third round of prizes begins in five minutes so get your raffle tickets in now!"

Jotaro sighed in relief as the obnoxiously happy annoucer finally finished her speech. Every time she talked, her grating voice made him want to punch the nearest wall. Who could possibly always be that happy? Under normal circumstances, he wouldn't even consider coming to this kind of event. School dances hadn't been his thing in high school and even in college he hadn't been big on parties. But having so many people in one place made looking for stand users somewhat easier. He nodded at Janos as he approached across the crowded dance floor, "You see anything?"

"Not really. The decorations are kind of distracting though. All these light strings hung up from these poles makes getting a clear line of sight kind of hard. The only thing you can see is that giant blue moon hanging from the ceiling." He looked up at the moon, which seemed to be fixed above the center of the room providing a cool nighttime blue glow. It looked to be maybe 20' across and was a perfect map of the real thing. Janos fancied he could almost see the footprints of the astronauts up there.

"Well don't get too comfortable; anyone here could be a stand user. I saw one of the Four Seasons earlier, so you should be ready to fight if things get ugly in here." Jotaro continued and looked about the room; but he didn't notice the boy named Ulrich anywhere.

Janos gave a half nod, looked distractedly about them. He'd thought he'd seen someone he recognized. "I'll be sure to watch myself." He slowly began moving through the throng of bodies as he worked his way towards the snacks table. As he passed by the announcer's table, he bumped into Jenny, who was try to reach the snacks herself. Janos took a step back and felt himself flush; luckily the lights dimmed out most of it. "Come here often?" He cursed internally, that was the worst opening line for the situation.

Jenny gave him a look that was halfway between pity and frustration. "Chris is here and I came along for the fun of it. You'd better not be stalking him. If I find out you did anything..."

Janos put up his hands in surrender, "I'm doing nothing of the sort. I actually go to this school you know. I have a reason to be here that isn't weird."

"Are you saying I don't?"

"No! I just mean..."

The announcer, a woman in her 40s or so passed by them. "Is everything alright?" She gave a sweet smile and looked concerned at the argument.

"Yeah, everything's great. The decorations are spectacular. I'm sure it must have taken a lot of work." Jenny gave the woman a winning smile.

"Oh, it was nothing. I'm glad you two are having fun. Be safe now," she winked and walked off.

"We aren't..." Janos began but she was already talking to someone else. He sighed and looked up at the moon on the ceiling. Sure would be nice if he could be on the moon right now. Or anywhere other than where he was.

Jenny followed his gaze up. "Is there something special up there?"

Janos was about to respond when he noticed the moon fading from light blue to a gentle golden white. He lowered his gaze back down and blinked. Jenny looked amazing. How had he not noticed that before? The way the light played on her hair, the way her lipstick made her eyes stand out, the curl of her hair around her shoulders... He shook his head but he couldn't stop thinking about how stunning she looked. Jenny looked down from the moon and met Janos's gaze. She blushed heavily, and turned her face away, but she continued to glance back. The two of them stood there for what seemed like ages before Jenny mumbled something about having to get a drink and she quickly pushed off into the crowd. Janos watched her go before making his way back to Jotaro in a daze.

"Janos, what's wrong? You look out of it. Hey, answer me."

Janos looked up at the man. "I just... I don't know. I just never really noticed how pretty Jenny is."

"Jenny?"

"Chris's older sister. She's here at the dance."

Jotaro gave a short "hmm" and looked about him. "Well that's something, but we need to focus on finding Ulrich so we can track him after he leaves."

At that precise moment, Jenny appeared at Janos's shoulder and tapped it. "May I have this next dance?"

Janos was about to, very enthusiastically, accept, but Jotaro stopped him. "We have work to do. You can meet up later."

"Oh come on, whatever you guys are doing, it can wait." Jenny grabbed Janos's arm and tried to pull him away.

Jotaro reached out and grabbed her shoulder, pulling her away from Janos. Someething inside Janos snapped. With a rush of dark purple aura surrounding him, Janos gut punched Jotaro, Twilight Zone's arm forming around his. Jotaro took a step backwards and glared at Janos. Janos glared back, one arm out protectively in front of Jenny. "Yare yare daze..."

Roughly the same time

Main street of Shepherdstown

Josuke looked up at the half moon in the sky trying to decide if it looked more like a smile or fan. A lone bird flitted overhead and alighted on a telephone wire. He returned his gaze to the four way stop in front of him. Kane stood at the other corner trying to sit nonchalantly on the stone wall that ran in front of the college. The two of them had come out to see if Bennet was still in town. Koichi was sitting on a bench at the third corner. But on a Sunday evening, it seemed the town was pretty dead. No one was passing by and there weren't really any cars driving through either.

"So Kane," he called across the street, "are American schools hard?"

Kane thought about it for a second. "Not really. I mean, they're not always that fun, but I don't they're really that hard. How about yours?"

"Nah, they're not that hard really."

"Speak for yourself!" Koichi interjected, "I'm struggling in English."

"You're doing pretty good as far as I can tell," offered Kane.

"Yeah, well I had some help from my girlfriend." Koichi gave a half nervous laugh. Kane was about to press the question but thought better of it. Koichi stood up and was about to ask the others if they were ready to head back when he noticed movement near the top of the hill. A man in a black suit was walking down the center of the street. Koichi started to point at him when the man jumped. Onto the roof of a house next to the street. Then the man jumped off the other side and Koichi lost sight of him. "Guys," he shouted, "I think we have a visitor. I saw a man on the road just..."

The man suddenly landed in the middle of the intersection.

"...now."

The boys brought out their stands and stared at the man. He turned slowly, taking in their expressions and faces. "Well, I came. I saw. Let's get this over with so I can determine whether you're even worth killing." He removed his suit coat and draped it over his arm.

Now that he had come in close, Koichi could see he was wearing an antiquated white dress shirt with leather suspenders. His slacks appeared to be of wool and the suit coat had a cut to it that reminded Koichi of a sailor's uniform. No one moved. The man walked towards Koichi. "Echoes Act 3! 3 Freeze!"

The man's left knee dropped towards the pavement, but he stopped himself just shy of hitting the ground before letting himself sink gently. "I wouldn't want to damage the road here. Your contribution is appreciated, but I've no further use for you. You are a threat, an you must die." Twin pink rays shot from his eyes, but they ricocheted into the air off of an invisible wall in front of him."

"I think that's our line," Kane growled.

As the vampire turned around, Josuke leaped forward with Crazy Diamond by his side. "Dorararararararara!" The vampire flew backwards and crashed into the side of the bakery. Not ones to give breathing room, the boys ran up to him to continue the assault.

"3 Freeze!"

"Dora!"

"Die already!"

The vampire began to resemble a ping pong ball more than a human as Fortress Around My Heart and Crazy Diamond batted him back and forth, Echoes using 3 Freeze to keep him from flying off too far. Finally, Fortress landed a solid blow to the chest and there was a loud crack. The body crashed into the ground bleeding profusely and it looked like a few bones had been torn from him; two bones that looked like ribs lay on the ground beside him. Crazy Diamond went in for a final punch. Then the vampire stood, grabbing the bones and using them to block Josuke's blow.

"Veni, vidi, damnavi."


End file.
